And The Artists Played On- The Tale of Sasori and Deidara
by Dunstin
Summary: What if Sasori survived his fight with Chiyo and Sakura and remained Deidara's partner? The two clashing artists stick together as they realize the murderer of Sasori's parents, Sakumo Hatake, has a son- who is among the shinobi hunting them; a potential for Sasori's revenge and Deidara to challenge the Sharingan. But they aren't the only ones working in the shadows.
1. Chapter 1- Limits of the Art

**What if, what if, what if... what if these two guys lived on beyond their respective deaths? The conflicting artists of longevity and the blast having stayed teamed up.**

 **Everything in the anime/manga is canon up until this point, everything after is my take in the most realistic fashion I can see it, with some curves thrown in. Let me know what you think of the opening chapter and such, I appreciate your input!**

 **I don't own** **Naruto** **and stuff, please don't sue me :(**

 **Without further adieu, the story begins.**

XXX

 **Sasori**

The puppets, _his_ puppets, the ultimate representation of what life could become in his hands. The shaper, the molder, there was power at his very fingertips-

But so did these two...

 _It's hard to believe that one hundred puppets is having difficulty matching up to an old woman and little brat. When I've already destroyed an entire village with these- it's impossible to conceive this happening. A hundred puppets, controlled by the best puppetmaster the world has ever seen? It's just preposterous...oops._

He tilted his head to the left to avoid being hit in the face by a flying puppet head. Not that he would feel any pain or be bothered by it, but it was still that naive human instinct.

 _No amount of puppetry is gonna be able to remove that. Just have to bury those instincts deep down until they're nothing anymore._

A few of Granny's puppets had been decommissioned, but the ratio of destruction with his own were disgruntling. _Is it time for the final surprise-?_

There was an odd sensation coming from behind. He whirled his head 180 degrees, and allowed a smirk to go across his wooden lips. _She's trying to seal my core again, thinking I'm distracted with the battle around. If only things were that easy, Granny Chiyo. Still, why not give her false hope?_

He ejected his core, and suddenly he was nothing but an invisible cylindrical housing, his entire conscience, life, and memory flying perilously through the battle. His remaining puppets fell to the ground as he gave up controlling them. _The fools will think they've won, and that's enough of a slip in their guard for me to come in and kill the old bat, once and for all!_

The precious core landed in another Sasori-puppet, much to his satisfaction. How many times had he made himself and admired his own creation? None of that useless human babble of love making, he could make as many human puppets as he wanted without the need for such painstaking emotions-

 _Focus, focus. Another time._

His eyes rolled into place, giving him the ability to see once more. Chiyo and the girl, Sakura, were staring at his original puppet body that had been hammered into the wall by Granny's seal.

 _And now, for this puppetmaster's final show!_

The poisoned blade lanced out-

-and struck the young girl in the abdomen, forcing the blade to come short of hitting the crazy witch-

"So you took the strike instead since you were going to succumb to the poisons effects before," he summarized. The mop of red hair shook as he contained his laughter. "Come on, I was looking forward to wringing that pretty neck of yours myself!"

 _But Granny Chiyo still has a bit of chakra left, I can see that. She'll try something... I need some way to loosen up her defenses._

The girl didn't respond. Her hands were glowing green- _that annoying medical ninjutsu of hers_ \- and pressed to the entrance and exit wounds his weapon had made. His lifeless eyes narrowed in mixed contempt and amusement. _Amazing she still has enough chakra for that, and to be skillful enough to heal herself while the wound is still being forced open? She was an impressive one indeed._ A wonderful idea came to him. _Maybe she'll make an impressive puppet, too-_

He extracted his blade for the smaller dagger hidden beneath the longer blade. His puppets were weapons themselves, much like a soldier would wield his kunai and jutsu. There was no end to the attacks he could make, to the greatness he could muster-

Poor Deidara. What would he be without him? If he wasn't there to help the brash young idiot out, he would truly be dying young.

He hefted his arm blade back with a small grin. _Then his life really will have lasted as long as a blast._ His movement faltered, however, as his began to move his arm to strike down the already dying girl.

 _And she's even younger than he is... longevity won't reach this one, that's for sure._

He made his face look as conflicted as possible, the puppet's blank eyes widening a moment before impact-

 _And... there. Not this time, Granny Chiyo._

Out of his shoulders, two long, thin blades shot out and impaled the two puppets that had been sneaking up along his left and right. The blades shot into their necks and took off their heads. He shifted his body into a circle, so that the blades broke through the bodies entirely, slicing them each in half.

"Don't tell me you thought I would be to focused on her to deal with you, Granny Chiyo?" he asked calmly, though beneath his puppet exterior in the small cylindrical of his core, his emotions were ripe with triumph. "I saw you manipulating those puppets a mile off, I wanted you to have a moment of hope before I grounded out your frail life!"

Truthfully, he had noticed the approaching puppets until the last moment. And even more troubling, he found himself questioning his motives before dodging. _I almost decided not to dodge. Why? That would have surely killed me, what was I thinking?_

He cleared his thoughts. He was Sasori of the Red Sand, the most powerful puppeteer in the world. He didn't have any doubt about himself, not when he was already so supreme. He shot his puppet head around to look at the feeble old bat. "You thought you were strong enough to _kill_ me? Don't make me laugh, witch!"

"Sasori... your mother and father wouldn't have wanted this for you..."

He made the puppet shrug, though in his core he felt brief queasiness. "Shut up, the past is done for. I no longer care for them..." He leveled his sword arm at her. "Just like I no longer care for you. There is only the future, to grow more powerful in my immortality."

"Sasori... the puppets..."

She had always held some sort of power over him, whether he liked it or not. She had nurtured him when he was alone, and had introduced him to puppetry. She was his only surviving family, and therefore his only tie to Sunagakure. The way she said his name, so desperately, it was just like back then when she had first tried to stop him.

And he hated it.

The blades on his shoulders detached and fell to the ground, to make him more lightweight and maneuverable. He jumped into the air towards her and undid the blade casing on his back. The windmill blade started to spin, and in an instant it was in his hand as he approached her feeble body.

Another moment passed, and then his hair was not the only thing stained red.

XXX

 **Deidara**

 _I enjoy a challenge, but this is getting ridiculous. Oops!_

He felt one of the girl's massive kunai brush right through his hair. He dove left, landed akwardly on his side. He forced his tired legs to push himself onto his feet, narrowly avoiding being pounded in the face by the jonin taijutsu master. The loss of both his arms was proving to be enormously damaging to his skills. He couldn't use his kekkai genkai at all his time for art was being lost!

 _Well... not all of it. Yet._ He dodged a particularly vicious kick and picked himself up. Who knew how long he had before they actually struck him, and then he would be without any means for escape. He jumped for the trees, hearing the _thunk thunk tink_ of multiple kunai embedding themselves in the tree, seeking him out like a swarm of bees. _There's some risk, but I can't risk being captured. Oh, that'd be just humiliating. Imagine having to have Sasori spring me- no, best not to think about it. Now, where is it..._

The mouths on his hands was just a more viable way of taking in the clay and turning it into art. Now, he could really say he was making art _himself_.

 _There it is._ He looked behind him. The four of them were hot on and heels. Kisame hadn't been bluffing, they all were pretty formidable.

 _Well, formidable without my arms that is. Oh, if I had them back, these guys would really know a fight. But as it is, it's time for a hasty escape._

He jumped down into the clearing, where his fallen clay bird laid. Bracing himself for the repulsive taste, he bit into the bird, eating it, kneading it inside himself. _I wonder if Sasori has ever tasted his own art? No, what the hell am I thinking... he can't even eat._

The four landed a few yards away, observing his next move. And to his pleasure, the Nine-Tails jinchuuriki and Kakashi Hatake landed right next to them.

He stood up, resisting the urge to belch.

"It's over, Akatsuki," said the taijutsu master. "Now, why don't you just give up and we can avid making this any messier than it has to be."

He laughed through his clone. He had already substituted himself while eating the bird, was now waiting in the ground for the coast to be clear. He was certain Hatake wouldn't detect him with that annoying Sharingan of his, not when they thought the clone was the real deal.

 _Nobody can figure out the exquisite nature of my art, not even him._

None of them would. Still, it was best to remind them exactly what would be their downfall.

The clone parted its mouth. "Art..."

It expanded, growing puffy, massive, excelling human size in a second. He heard their gasps and smiled to himself as they took in his majesty.

"...is an EXPLOSION!"

The clone went off. That was it, end story. He slunk away further into the earth. There was no point in staying if he couldn't watch his own power express itself. Knowing they were dead was good enough for him.

XXX

Some time later, when he was certain the coast was clear, he emerged from the earth, spitting out a mouthful of dirt. "Damn, I really hate using that jutsu. And now by arms are infected, just great."

He didn't mind talking to himself. He had done enough of it when he was rogue. Besides, didn't all intelligent people talk to themselves? It was just a mind opening exercise, and if that meant it would open him up to greater practices, all the better.

"Time to find my man Sasori, jeez he must have finished ages ago, it's already dark out. Damn, now he'll just get on my case about keeping him waiting... _and_ listen to him about how careless I was about losing my other arm. Just spectacular."

He walked through the forest, whistling to himself, occasionally spitting out the taste of his clay. _No, I should like it. It's power incarnate!_

Something vibrated in his chest. No, against it. He sighed and took off his Akatsuki robe entirely, ripping open the collar with his teeth. Out of the robe fell a small puppet, rattling ceaselessly.

"Sasori's getting impatient... what a surprise." He started running towards the direction of the hideout, feeling eager to meet his partner again and return to the main base for his arms to be sewn back on. Finally, after an hour of labored breathing and heavy footsteps, he reached the edge of the clearing and entered the rocky womb of the hideout.

 _No way, he's out of Hiruko?_

"Yo, Sasori!"

The red hair swiveled around and he stepped back from the two bodies at his feet. His Akatsuki cloak was nowhere to be found, and instead his whole body was exposed. There were blades popping out of him every which way, mant of them stained red. The entire battlefield was filled with broken, unmoving puppets, shattered rock and earth, and splotches of blood.

He jumped over to his partner. "Sasori, don't tell me these two actually held you up, hmm?"

"Where's your other arm?"

"Eh..."

"Idiot." He stuck a hand into a compartment in his body and withdrew a cloak of dark fabric, tossed it around his shoudlers carelessly. "They held me up but I took care of them. I see you failed to retrieve the jinchuuriki."

He blew a stray piece of sweaty, matted hair out of his mouth. "Don't look at me, I did my job. You know, these two really did a number on you? Where's Hiruko-"

"You should talk. Oh wait, you can't because you lose those delightful little mouths on your hands."

"Alright, alright. The mission's done, at any rate. Let's get back to base and-"

There was a disturbance in the air around them. They looked down to their right to see Zetsu emerging. The white one looked them over and seemed to suppress a grin. "Looks like you two had a rough evening."

 _Not him, too._ "Yeah, save it, hmm."

A deeper voice came up. "Where's the jinchuuriki?"

"Don't look at me, I did my job." He nudged Sasori. "If this guy hadn't been playing around with the old woman and the girl we probably could've subdued the whole lot of them."

"Next time, then," Black Zetsu stated.

"But now there's someone we'd like you to meet," White Zetsu said brightly. "Come on out, Tobi!"

 _Tobi? Sounds like something I'd name my dog._ He glanced over at Sasori, but his face was expressionless as always. _He won't say it, but whatever went down at this fight wore him out. Maybe we can talk it over with some saki... oh dammit he can't even drink! Having a puppet for a partner is just so boring... and having a partner with such unappetizing art only strains things._

A man came skittering down the rocky wall of the hideout. "Hellooooooo everyone!"

Deidara blinked. "Zetsu, what type of someone is he?"

"He's a good someone," said Black Zetsu thoughtfully.

"He's a good boy."

The man called Tobi reached the bottom of the wall and proceeded to trip and fall face down onto the ground. Deidara stared. _A good boy? He can't even walk._

"Nobody saw that, right?" the man said hurriedly. When no one replied, he just straightened and dusted himself off. He was wearing an orange mask with a single eye hole to peer out of. Deidara strained his eyes but couldn't see any sign of life within the hole.

Tobi walked up to Deidara, hand stretched out. "Hello! I'm gonna be your new partner!"

Deidara glanced at his two stumps, then looked at Sasori inquisitively.

For the first time, Tobi seemed to take into account the puppet master. "Oh, uh... you're still alive then?"

Sasori stared blankly. "Does it look like I'm not? Zetsu, what sort of joke is this?"

White Zetsu sighed. "Tobi wants to join Akatsuki very badly. He has unique... skills... that would be beneficial to the organization. We brought him along to meet you-"

"To meet Deidara," Sasori said gruffly. "You expected me die out here, then?"

"N-no-"

The cloak swirled around. "Good. You can dismiss this sorry excuse for a shinobi, now. Deidara, come. We're leaving."

 _As straightforward as ever._ Deidara gave a farewell nod to Zetsu, another odd look at the downcast Tobi, then began walking alongside Sasori in the direction of the main base.

XXX

 **Tobi**

"Hmm, well I would say your entrance was a little premature, wouldn't you say, Tobi?"

"You said he was going to die. You said the old woman would be good enough to deal with him."

"I was wrong."

He sat down on a rock, began fiddling with a nearby puppet arm. "This slows things down now. Nagato won't allow me to join with no vacancies. All thanks to your idiotic miscalculations."

"I liked it better when you were in character."

"Oh, _BOTHER_!" he yelled, throwing up his hands for emphasis as he raised his voice to a higher pitch. "What _ever_ shall I do now?"

"I would hope the answer is obvious," Black Zetsu said flatly. "Create a vacancy. Get rid of Sasori yourself instead of relying on Konoha to do it for you."

He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "There's the sweet spot," he said softly. "I've been in the shadows long enough, it's time to move out into the open and do things right." He stood up, adjusted his mask. "If you want something done right, you do it yourself... **Kamui."**

Gone with the wind.


	2. Chapter 2- Hidden Thoughts, Hiden Jutsu

XXX

 **Deidara**

Without his hands, the journey would have to be at a crawl, already two days, which wasn't helping Sasori's impatient attitude. Because he had lost so much blood from his unfortunate loss of limbs, moving around so much made them travel by foot, instead of going tree leaping.

"So tell me, Sasori, what _did_ happen to those puppets of yours?" he asked jovially, nudging his partner again. "Come on, I'm dying to find out what they did to push you so far, hmm!"

"I was distracted with other things. It wasn't that they pushed me far, I was toying with them to give them a false sense of victory."

 _As much as I don't want to believe in his strength, it's probably likely. He's always had it out for this Granny. Even with her legendary puppet mastery and that girl's power, those two never stood the ghost of a chance._

"Then what about Hiruko?" he said instead, keeping his thoughts to himself. "You never let your little flesh guys get destroyed like that."

The puppet's head spun around and glared. "They're human puppets. And you shouldn't be talking like my work is invincible, they can only be pushed to so much magnificence. Every stroke in art can create an error. Hiruko was my favorite, but now that he's been destroyed, he's simply another error. There's no sense of wanting to keep a tool that's already proven to be flawed. I'll create myself a new puppet soon, and that'll be that." He turned away again, staring straight ahead. "Now stop asking these tedious questions and walk faster."

He bit back a curse and shuffled faster. _If I wasn't so badly hurt..._

"What happened with the Nine-Tails?"

"Oh, so now you can ask questions but I can't, hmm?"

"My questions are relevant to the mission we were sent on, yours are pointless and only trying to find reasons to find superiority in your art."

"Oh haha, funny man."

One of the flawless puppet arms came up and twirled it's index finger in a swirling motion, while Sasori continued to look ahead. "Come on. Speak."

He shrugged, not wanting to anger Sasori. "Fine, fine. The jinchuuriki and Kakashi were tailing me, and then one of them - I'm assuming Kakashi, the kid looked pretty confused- hit me with some weird long-distance jutsu that sucked my arm off-"

A sound like a choked laugh came from the living puppet.

"You think that's funny?"

"Just thinking about what it's like being flesh and bones again. Don't mind me, do go on."

 _He's enjoying himself, mister "I don't care about anything, my art is so superior, I'm not human." I almost wish those two women had pushed him enough to scare that constant smirk off his face._

"Then I crashed into the forest and nearly got killed by the jinchuuriki. He went through a transformation, but Hatake stopped him with some sort of sealing jutsu. Then I ran into even _more_ trouble, but I fought them off effortlessly, hmm." He puffed out his chest, making what was left of his shoulders broader. "Even with no arms, I still showed them what's what."

"Right, right..."

Something was off in Sasori's voice, and he started. _Nothing_ was ever off in Sasori's voice. "What are you thinking about, Sasori my man, hmm?"

They were exiting the forest, approaching a fork in the road. One detailed to the path towards Harachi Village, on the border of Konohagakure and Amegakure, and which also happened to contain the main hideout. The other trail was towards Tenchi Bridge, and further on, Otogakure, the Land of Sound.

Sasori turned to face him. "Go on towards the base. I have to do something first."

Deidara blinked. "What are you talking about, we're returning to base, hmm!"

"I have an appointment with one of my more treasured spies, I'm not going to miss it, nor am I going to be late by waiting around for you to limp along."

"What the hell, you can't just walk off like that and leave me hanging! I don't even have any arms!"

"Didn't you just say you fought four shinobi perfectly without any?"

 _Dammit, the one time he could be bothered to listen._ He bit his lip to prevent himself from making a plea that would've sounded desperate. "Oh fine, just get out of here then. Don't let me slow you down, hmm!"

"Glad we understand each other. See you in a few days."

Sasori took off so quickly Deidara thought his magnification eye had malfunctioned for a moment. _Damn him, always speeding off and never wanting to work together. How come all the rest of them stick together and get to work on these crazy combination moves? Oh, that's because my good-for-nothing partner always sends me off alone like this!_

He closed his eyes, calming himself. "Doesn't matter," he said aloud to himself. "I don't need him either. He could have died back there and I wouldn't have even cared!"

The words sounded hollow as one of Sasori's puppets.

XXX

 **Sasori**

He had been right there, in front of him, back at the cave. What would he have done, had he known who he really was then?

 _I didn't even know that he had had a son. This is..._

The only emotions he allowed himself to show anymore were amusement and impatience. The rest had been tucked away along with the rest of his humanity. Countless months of pain as he had experimented upon himself to become the perfect being. A weapon in itself. No one in the world would ever be able to match up to him. He had heard that a few years ago the Village of Artisans had risen up in his own home country, trying to recreate the "Human Weapon" concept.

They had never come close. He had surpassed them before they had even begun their research.

 _And a weapon knows only how to kill, not to feel emotions._ He angrily clutched the front of his dark cloak, his wooden fingers easily tearing through the fabric to scrape against his wooden chest. There was no satisfaction in the gesture; he dropped his hand and clenched it instead. _Then why am I feeling like this? He's just a person of the past that I cast away with my humanity. Nothing more!_

He looked up at the sky, trying to loosen his mind. The sun had set without him noticing it; he was walking alone in the darkness. Being a puppet that knew no age, only a loose concept of time, the changes of days never concerned him.

Foolish Deidara was at risk. Without his arms, the source of his jutsu, Deidara would be a sitting duck. He didn't exactly care for Deidara's well being, he was just a side show, always blabbering about his sculptures, trying to impress Sasori. Deidara's self-absorption would get him killed at a young age, he knew. _Kids like him always think they're so strong, overconfidence brimming over the pot of his limitations. Maybe tonight will be the day I bury him instead, who knows. It's not my concern._

He preferred to be away from Deidara. He was used to working alone. A puppet master never shared his secrets with another, they always worked in seclusion. That, in addition to being a S-rank rogue shinobi, he had rarely shared another's company. Seclusion was what he was best at. His impatience came from always having done things at his own fast pace; having a talkative, distracting partner around slowed things down, ruined that speed. Yes, things were always better alone.

Perhaps he would take his revenge alone, too-

 _No! Enough of thinking like that. The past is forgotten. Granny Chiyo was the last tie to the past, and she's dead at last. No remorse. No second thoughts. None of that-_

There was a snag in that. He had almost let himself be killed- _almost died, what the hell?-_ for some inexplicable reason. _What had caused it? There's no logic behind it, no reasoning to supplement that action. I'm a weapon without thought, I am the ultimate magnificence of the shinobi, a calculating machine._

But he had said it himself. Even magnificence had limitations. Every stroke of art could create an error.

His core was whirring with calculation and thought. There was only one explanation. The killing of Granny Chiyo. The influx of emotions. The appearance of this specter of the past.

He didn't believe in coincidences. There was no factual way to support them.

Coincidences weren't logical. But the inner, deepest part of the mind that created thought and awareness, were.

And that meant a part of him still retained his humanity. And that meant he was still weak. And that meant he had to solve the problem.

 _Crack._ He had clenched his hands to an inhuman strenght, and the wood had been unable to handle the pressure. He examined it. A small crack ran long from the palm to the wrist, yet another imperfection.

He relaxed, trying to calm himself. When he reached Tenchi Bridge and met Kabuto, the spy he had implanted into Orochimaru's service long ago, the information would sooth him. Knowledge was a useful thing, more powerful than any jutsu.

 _Knowledge is power._

A single sign on the beaten path. _Tenchi Bridge- 1 Mile. Please tread carefully if wind currents are stronger than normal._

He would get his information, then meditate on how best to kill Kakashi Hatake, the son of the man who had killed his parents. Chiyo had said it had been a brief, unfair battle. An assassination.

He had never known the murderer had had a son. He wondered if Hatake knew who he even was, if he knew of their connection of blood.

A small smile tugged at his mouth as the bridge came into view. A single man stood on it, standing stoically, observing, glasses shining as the morning sun arose.

 _Knowledge is power. And when enough power is available, anything is possible._

Time was a loose concept to him. He would dismiss the past when he washed Kakashi's lifeblood off his hands.

XXX

 **Deidara**

"Hey, easy, easy!"

"Would you relax, I know what I'm doing."

"You say that, but you never wen't to medical scho- _SON OF A_ -"

"Shut up!"

Kakuzu finished putting the last thread in, and suddenly there was a rush of impossible amounts of life running along his left side. He exhaled in satisfaction, quietly sucking back up the tear that had been forming in his right eye.

The old warrior of the Akatsuki stood up. "Flex it."

He did so. His right arm, so kindly retrieved by Zetsu from his battle with Kakashi and the jinchuuriki, was once again attached to him. The mouth on his palm suddenly stuck its lolling tongue back in its mouth, and the teeth came together in a smile.

Kakuzu watched him with mild disgust. "Alright, alright. Now what do you want to do about the right? There isn't another one of your special arms lying around to justu sew back on."

Yes, that was a problem. Fortunately, the solution was fairly simple. "If you can just sew on a regular arm, I can perform the ancient technique to restore the mouth onto it, restoring the kekkai genkai."

"Whatever goes, art boy. You're lucky Hidan has an infatuation with limbs of deceased peoples."

XXX

Some time later, the second arm was fully attached. At first, it had resisted connecting to his body due to the regularity of the arm and the uniqueness of his body structure caused by the Explosion Kekkai Genkai. Kakuzu had found a solution by creating a medium of both the arm's and Deidara's cells and mixing them together into a blended, wrinkly red tissue. The arm was now attached and functioning properly.

Kakuzu stood up, shaking his hands free of some stray blood droplets. "Done. Now don't do something stupid again, if you can manage it."

Deidara held up his arms in protest. "How is it every time I get injured it's because I'm stupid? Where's the damn justice, hmm!"

The older man's eye twitched with the ending grunt. "Just don't have me sewing on your arms again." He walked away into another section of the hideout. Deidara looked around. Everyone was in a deeper section or occupied elsehwere. It was just him and the towering Gedo Statue for company.

"My art is my best kept secret, hmm," he said to the statue. "You won't tell anyone about this, right?"

The statue did not reply. Not that he had expected it to, but he wanted _something_ to be there to witness the ultimate show. And what better thing was that than a statue that would never come to life?

He placed his palms together. He felt the right hand recoil upon contact, but he kept them together.

 **"Hiden Iwagakure Kinjutsu: Material Animation."**

The air around him started to hum, the molecules trembling as his chakra stretched out. He grunted, focusing it into his left arm.

The secret to his art was really two separate techniques. His kekkai genkai allowed his chakra to turn into powerful explosions, imbuing it into whatever he wanted. However, this proved to be a problem as there were not always objects available. The answer had arrived in a kinjutsu of Iwagakure, the Material Animation Technique. By taking in malleable material through mouths created on the users hands, the user was able to put his chakra into the said object. The clay he wielded was such a material, easy to acquire and meeting the requirements.

Plus, it had solved his desire to find art. Now he could create these fine sculptures, and then detonate them into even more masterful creations.

The hand was beginning to form on his palm. He gritted his teeth; the pain was high. The flesh ripped open, and teeth emerged where teeth should have never existed. The tongue protruded next as the muscles contracted into softer tissue.

He shakily slowed his chakra flow, breathing heavily. Blood ran down his palm, but he had accomplished what he needed. His arms had been restored, and that meant he was back to full strength. The artist was back in action!

 _And now it's time to rub it all in Sasori's face, hmm! I'll show him who's "to slow" when I'm soaring above his head!_


	3. Chapter 3- The Serpent and the Spy

**Thanks for the initial reviews, much appreciated :)**

 **Sorry for the long wait as well, was on vacation and was also on a bit of writer's block. But now its back on track!**

XXX

 **Sasori**

He walked onto the bridge as it titled queasily in the breeze. Kabuto stood idly in about the middle, his glasses glaring off the morning sun. He brushed his red hair out of his eyes and stopped a few feet shy of his informant.

He had easily beaten Kabuto in the past and broken his mind into being an obedient servant before sending him back to Orochimaru to spy on. The former Akatsuki member was an object of interest to Sasori, not just because of the power he wielded, but simply that the power was so immense that he could not go unchecked. Injecting Kabuto into his side was a precaution, as much as an amusement to have the snake be unaware.

And power was an attractive feature as well. It made the individual stronger, and thus made them live longer.

 _And I'm all for that._

"Kabuto."

"Master Sasori."

Immediately he saw something was off. _He didn't bow. And his stance..._

"What news do you have for me, Kabuto?"

The man shrugged. "Nothing you have probably not already heard. Sasuke Uchiha is in his possession and is being trained day after day. There is not much else to say."

Sasori took another step forward, his puppet eyes staring, trying to see behind the shining glasses. "What of Orochimaru himself?"

"His health is progressing." Sasori waited for more information, but nothing was forthcoming. _Something's wrong, he's holding back. There's something amiss, has he broken control?_

The wind kicked up. There was only one way to tell. "Where is your master now?"

"Back at his hideout-"

Sasori's puppet arm swiveled about, releasing the thin scimitar, and made to cleave the young man through the stomach. As expected, Kabuto was still as skillful as ever, and back flipped long before the blade had reached the spot he had been at before.

"Lord Sasori?" He was still feigning loyalty.

"There's no longer any point, my former little spy," Sasori grunted, retracting the scimitar for a more maneuverable weapon. "I can see you've slipped from my service."

The perfectly confused face switched a hard set one. "What gave it away?"

"You referred to your 'master' as Orochimaru. When one comes to serve under another so long, it comes reflexive to address as master." The puppet arm broke apart in many spots, the wood sliding out of place, and numerous small blades stretched out, all glistening with his unique poison. "The jutsu placed on you erased that impulse... which can only mean you've slipped free."

Kabuto's hands shimmered blue, and he held them up defensively. His mouth curled into a leer, but Sasori's keen eyes could see the sweat trickling from his forehead. _He's unbearably nervous._

"So you're going to kill me?"

"You know me very well." He dashed forward and swiped with his multiple small blades. Kabuto swung his chakra scalpel and caught two of the blades, causing a deadlock.

"What the-!"

Three other blades had begun swiveling about interdependently, while a fourth extended significantly to strike the former slave in the gut. Kabuto jumped into the air and kicked the extending blade away, causing Sasori to spin around. The hum of the chakra blade came close to his head-

He swiveled his head around to directly face his opponent, then shot out a series of poisoned darts out of his mouth. Kabuto switched from offensive to defensive and slashed all the incoming needles expertly. Not one bit of poison had gotten into his skin, but he was already breathing heavily. No human would have been able to move like Sasori, to talk from every direction and manipulate weapons so easily. It was a taxing battle for anyone.

"Your skills are still as sharp as ever," Sasori commented smoothly, retracting all his blades. "Seems your new master has taught you some new tricks."

Kabuto smiled. He stood up faced the puppet master with amused eyes.

 _He's here, then._ "Then how about he comes out, then?" he said aloud to the forest behind Kabuto. "Before I make a mess out of his little servant boy."

A shape darted out of the trees, landed behind Kabuto. He recongizned Orochimaru instantly, the features were as sharp and identifiable as ever. The pale face, green snake-eyes, sickly skin tone, and disgusting tongue.

"Sasori, my dear, dear partner. Whatever are you doing out here in a place like this?" The tongue slipped back into the impossibly large mouth. "Away from the mothership?"

"The Akatsuki is a part time job," he replied loftily. He gestured towards Kabuto. "Seems like you've taken my spy away from me. How did you do it." He said it not as a question, but as a command. Orochimaru had been his partner, after Sasori and the Leader had forcibly beaten him into submission. Therefore, Sasori was the superior force here.

The snake smiled. "You didn't come out here just to hear why. You came here for something else..."

"Information. On you."

The arms spread in an inviting manner. "Then please, ask away, my old friend! I'm sure I can satisfy your curiosity."

The bridge creaked ominously. Sasori casually undid the button holding the cloak together, and allowed it to fly off entirely.

Orochimaru tilted his head. "Or perhaps you want to settle something?"

"You could say that."

Kabuto looked back and forth between the two, then jumped out of the way. The air seemed to cool significantly, though Sasori could not exactly feel it against his smooth artificial exterior. He merely sensed the environment bracing itself.

In a moment, the white fiend's sleeve was filled with hungry, biting snakes, racing towards Sasori. He lifted up his arm to protect himself, and multiple fangs sunk into them. Orochimaru heaved his arm, and the snakes, carrying Sasori, followed. He went flying into the air, but the situation was still very much in his control.

His palms came apart with a crack and the two flamethrowers popped out. He released a tirade of fire that shot down onto the bridge and his opponent, momentarily overpowering the light of the morning sun as the ground became swallowed in a orange haze.

 _But he's much better than that to be taken in so easily._ Still soaring through the sky, he retracted the flamethrowers and pulled out Blade. He had no real name for it, only called it that to give it the respect it deserved. He had claimed it from an old puppet-master who in turn had claimed he was the descendant of the Omoroski or Ototaski clan or whatever it was called, the clan that had originally created puppets. Regardless if the old man's story had been true, the Blade had broken all of Sasori's own tempered swords that day, earning it the position to be his personal weapon of choice.

True to his hypothesis, the flames suddenly seemed to stretch out towards him as Orochimaru flew out of them. He was clutching his infamous Sword of Kusangi, another legendary weapon of history. The clash of mystic steel made the air ripple and sparks fly. They grappled in midair, trying to gain leverage over each other.

The snake face grinned, then his tongue suddenly lanced out. It wrapped around his sword arm and tugged him down. He clutched the sword firmly in his hand-

His eyes tracked sudden movement below him. The former Akatsuki's foot crashed into his head and sent him spinning out of control towards the ground. He tried to pull himself into a controlled dive, but the ferocious wind prevented him from moving his sword arm. The ground was racing toward him quickly, and he found himself irresistibly shutting his eyes in that cowardly human fashion-

There was a huge rush of the air beside and then bloew him. He hit something soft but solid, to soon and not the right texture to be earth. He opened his eyes. _A white ground?_

"Yo, Sasori why'd you have to go tangling with a dried out loser like this guy, hmm?"

 _Of course he would come looking. Why am I not even surprised._ He clutched a handful of the clay bird and then relaxed his grip. _At least he came. Now the tables can turn._

XXX

 **Deidara**

He guided the bird through the air, keeping Orochimaru in his sights. Sasori and the rest of Akatsuki had never spoken of him in warm tones, and his power was well respected. The rumor was that he was the most wanted shinobi in Konohagakure, on par with Itachi.

 _In other words, he's the perfect person to be made an example of with my art._

There was another young man, around his own age, standing off to the side. No doubt he had some purpose in the situation, but he hardly mattered.

"Let's size up the old man with some C2 explosives then, shall we?" He dug his palms into the bags at his hips, letting them chew up and mold the clay. He clapped them together, pouring his chakra into the creation-

"What an interesting sidekick to possess, Sasori of the Red Sand," called Orochimaru from below. "But I must say he's a far cry from being anything remotely useful. It seems all he can do is help you run away!"

 _Sidekick!_

Sasori let his laugh trail down. "You'll find were both full of our own surprises." He dropped his voice down to just above a whisper. "You _do_ have a plan, right? I'm not going to let myself look like an idiot for nothing."

"Oh stop your worrying and just enjoy the show!" He spread apart his palms, and in them rested a small pig-like creature. He threw it up into the air and did the hand signs, and suddenly it went from an almost childlike toy into a bloated, demonic looking machination.

"Is this-?"

"Oh, you know it!" The pig-like clay creature abruptly dive-bombed towards Orochimaru, who jumped to get out of it's line of attack-

"Oh, you wish snake-man." He concentrated his chakra, making his creation follow the former Akatsuki.

 _But that won't be enough, will it? Not against one of the famed Sannin, hmm..._

Orochimaru took off running, obviously having some inkling that nothing good would happen if the clay animation struck him. He jumped into the canyon, but Deidara knew there was no chance for it to escape his seeking explosions.

A small detail caught his eye. _The other man, where did he go?_

The answer came as something struck the underbelly of the bird and wrenched it open. Both he and Sasori went falling through the sky, and he hastily dug into his picket for another quick transformation. He formed the bird, did the hand sign-

"Not this time, blondie!" A blue hue came carving out of nowhere and struck his right arm in the raw red mix, sending unbelievable pain running along his body. Whatever jutsu the man used was a high caliber, precise injury one, focusing chakra into a sharp blade that didn't pierce the skin but instead went for the vulnerable muscle beneath.

He stuffed the bird back into his palm, and this time the Iwagakure rogue spat out something a lot smaller.

 **"KATSU!"**

The little insect-balls of C1 clay spread out like a blanket, lighting up the field in miniature explosions. His attacker was lost in the smoke and fire, and Deidara saw him clumsily falling to the ground.

"Teach you to mess with an artist, hmm!"

Sasori had landed well enough, and was looking down into the canyon to observe the chase. Orochimaru was running up along the vertical canyon wall now. Deidara raised an impressed eyebrow. _He's managed to keep up the speed this long? Old man's got some stamina. But, time to add him to the museum._

The clay animation put on a burst of speed, seemingly growing larger-

 **"KATSU!"**

The canyon lit up in a miniature sun, causing the bridge to shake tremendously. Smoke unfurled from the depths like a witch's cauldron, and below the sound of crashing rock thundered above to the heavens.

He smiled gleefully to himself. _And that was only a C2!_ He unclasped his hands, knowing the battle was still unfinished.

From within the smoke, a massive snake emerged, a summoning no doubt. It's head craned out of the canyon, Orochimaru on it's head.

He threw down the bird, flattened himself down on it as the serpent's head came dangerously close to batting him out of the sky. He dug into his pockets for more clay. _Something that can really tie up this beast and his trainer up..._

"Deidara!" He looked down, saw Sasori with a new puppet. _A sealing one._ The puppet eyes looked up at him, conveying intent. He saw it, nodded his assent. _The old one-two, then, hmm._

XXX

 **Sasori**

The appearance of the serpent wouldn't have been problematic if he still had his hundreds of puppets available. As it was, he only had a handful of scrolls left, not to mention only one more elemental scroll.

 _But this puppet will do the job, if Deidara can do_ his _job right._

The terrorist sculptor swooped down onto the snake, playing risk with the fangs. The monster lashed out once, twice, snapping its jaws at the hem of his trailing cloak. Orochimaru was oddly just observing Deidara, not making any move of his own to attack...

"That's an interesting kekkai genkai you possess," the Sannin called out, his curiosity tangible. "Such a gifted prodigy of Iwagakure... how on earth did you end up in a mud organization such as this one?"

 _He likes unique jutsu,_ Sasori remembered. _Kekkai genkai, if I remember. There was that Kaguya Clan boy, and then the rumor of a woman who could utilize crystals. Now he has the Sharingan... could he really be making a move for..._

The thought seemed disgusting to him. _What would anyone want with someone like Deidara, kekkai genkai or not? He's almost a liability._

He brought his hands together and did the hand signs, and the scroll popped out of his shoulder joint and into his clasped palms. _Can't be helped. But, it's time to show these two who's really in control here._

 **"Forty-Nine Blades Dance!"**

He ripped open the scroll, and from within it spears, swords, axes, kunai, and other assorted weapons shot out, controlled by some invisible force. They plunged into the snake from down into the canyon up into its body, running along it's impossibly long structure and puncturing every organ the beast had.

Sasori came out with the Blade as the finish to the technique. Orochimaru, confused by the sudden pain and death ripping through his snake, swiveled his head with wide eyes at Sasori's approach-

"Take my spies from me, will you?" he growled at his old partner. "Always a bit to greedy, weren't you?"

The mouth spread in an inhumanely thin lipped smile. "Not greedy, just in pursuit of more things, my old friend." The Sword of Kusangi clashed against his Blade, knocking it away from being impaled into his right lung. They struggled in a deadlock, their full might pressed against each other. "We're both masters of power," the snake went on. "He was hardly 'yours.' But that's besides that point now. You and Akatsuki are a meddlesome organization that needs to be put down."

"I could say the same about you." He pushed vigorously against the other, and he stumbled back against the burst of wooden strength. "All these experiments you've conducted can hardly be justified, can they?"

Orochimaru recovered quickly, came slashing back, and again the deadlock reformed. Their strength was equalized, both had progressed heavily in their pursuit of strength. "But what of your own experiments," the snake whispered back. "How many lives to craft your own invincibility? We are not to different from each other, Sasori, we are both just two-"

 _"Don't talk about things you can never understand!"_ The Blade sliced down ferociously, the strength of it causing sparks to fly off the Sword of Kusangi. The sword tilted left as he brought his weapon up again, this time severing Orochimaru's arm off at the base. He finished with a kick that sent his one-time partner flying off the head of the dying snake and into the swinging Tenchi Bridge. The structure splintered upon impact and collapsed into the chasm, hundreds of meters down.

The snake blew up in a puff of smoke, but he had already jumped down in a more controlled vise into the chasm. Behind him, he could hear the rushing of Deidara on his clay bird.

Both landed safely into the chasm, where the wreckage of the bridge and Orochimaru sat quietly among shifting dust. The Sannin was still alive, of course, but the damage he had sustained was more than enough satisfaction.

Orochimaru hefted his last arm in mock surrender. "I yield, I yield."

Sasori shrugged off the feeble attempt and kicked him onto his stomach. "The Uchiha boy. He was from Konohagakure, wasn't he?"

A horrid coughing sound from the overturned body. "What of it?"

"Konohagakure doesn't have a lot of missing-nin, and they rarely allow them to stay missing for long. There's been several attempts by members of his old team to retrieve him." He bent over and picked up the Sannin by his purple sash, then with his other hand grabbed him by the throat. The snake eyes, once mocking and amused, were now barred with unmasked hatred and pain.

And worry. He was worried. About Sasori? About his line of questioning?

Fear was useful. He bent in close to the pale face. "That same team has been active in this area. I want them."

"To what end?"

The puppet fingers closed tightly around the other's neck. The snake eyes continued to glare, making no recognition of the pain.

"You don't need to know that, do you? But I require the use of Uchiha as bait for them to arrive. When they come and I've captured them, the boy will be yours to do as you please again. But the team itself I need."

He was aware Deidara was staring at him, probably in disbelief. The plan in his mind sounded reasonable, lure in Kakashi and his team with their missing member, then capture the jinchuuriki while killing Kakashi Hatake. But as he said it, he immediately realized how foolish it sounded. There was no way he would get this Uchiha boy to listen to him, especially when he was forcing his master to send him off. And what if they didn't even send in Team 7?

 _What am I thinking..._

His grip loosened. In an instant, a massive dark bornw snake ejected itself from Orochimaru's mouth and wound itself around his arm. It squeezed, and he felt the wood creak in protest. He reacted by protruding several blades out of his arm, stabbing the snake in multiple places.

Orochimaru skittered up the vertical rock wall, taking off to his hideout undoubtedly.

That only left-

The hum of condensed chakra came close to his head. He shot his arm out like a piston, and he was met with a warm spray over his whole body.

Deidara gasped, having been to slow to actually see what happened. The inhuman speed Sasori could move was often to fast for the human eye to register, so it had merely appeared his arm had teleported into Kabuto's stomach.

At any rate, the result was the same. The blue hand came pathetically down on his shoulder, making a small indent. The eyes grew dim behind the cracked glasses, until both the hand and glasses fell away.

"Traitor," he said to the body on the ground. "What a weak sense of loyalty."

"Right, hmm," Deidara said, unnerved by the spectacle. "So, uh, what's the plan now? You weren't serious about that whole Uchiha kid thing, were you? Not that I have a problem with him, I'd love to fight someone with a Sharingan to hone my skills for Itachi, but controlling him like that would be impossible, hmm."

"I know, I was only trying to scare him with the notion of taking his prized possession away."

"Oh! Well, good play, hmm." The blonde shifted uneasily, rubbed his hand along his bird. "What was that about Kakashi Hatake, though?"

Sasori sat down, closed his eyes. He needed to think, and rest. Not rest in the terms of sleep, he never slept anymore. Rest as in recuperate his chakra and gather his thoughts.

"He is our new target. The Nine-Tails as well, if we can manage."

"Why Hatake?"

He paused, trying to find a suitable reason. "Because you wanted to test your might against the Sharingan, didn't you? So don't question it. He's just our target now, that's it."

Deidara grumbled a little, finally conceded. "Alright, so how do we bring them in?"

"We don't, we go to them. I have an informant in a central crossroads village not to far from here. We'll see if they've passed through, and then trace them."

The young artist ran a through his hair nonchalantly. "Fine, hmm. Just let me know when we take off, I'm going to go sculpt."

Sasori smiled, still facing away from his partner. Sculpt was just his way of saying he was probably going to demolish the forest.

"Don't take long, I'll only be a few minutes. We have little time to spare before they return to the village."

"And I won't miss my chance."


	4. Chapter 4- Getting Dressed for Battle

XXX

 **Deidara**

He squeezed his hands, letting the tongues slide around his palms as he dived them back into the clay pouches.

 _Call me a sidekick? I'll show that... that_ freak _..._

He spread out his hands and the hundreds of C1 clay insects branched out into the forest in a white blanket. Down, down, his art sailed.

 **"Katsu."**

In an instant, the life and green had been replaced by destruction and orange. When the light and smoke had cleared, he could see multiple sections of the forest missing, disintegrated by his art. Where there had been life, he had successfully transformed it into something better. His art was a tool of beauty and change, through heat and flame he brought wonder.

It was just that people typically didn't like it.

He painted for a good couple more hours, venting his frustration at the earth. _Always overshadowed by Sasori. Doubting my power even when I come to save his ass from breaking apart on the ground. It's just never enough, what do I have to do to prove-?_

The C3 gargoyle flew down and vaporized a large section of the forest, perhaps a whole kilometer of destruction. _Would that have been enough to prove I'm more than capable of just handling MYSELF-_

He swooped down to Sasori's location. To his surprise, his partner had still been sitting, not having so much as twitched.

"Ready to move on?" he grunted.

"Don't be so loud next time, I could hardly think."

His shoulders sagged as Sasori stood up _. I shouldn't have expected anything else, hmm._

"Good work on coming when you did. Not that the fall would have harmed me, my core would have reformed my body. But it saved me valuable time. Thanks."

He straightened up, put on his most professional tone. "Yeah, don't worry about it. I had everything under control."

"So it seemed." The puppet head cocked, but it didn't turn to face him. "How's the arms?"

"I'm getting used to them. Come on, didn't you say we had somewhere to be, hmm?"

The puppetmaster was up in an instant, seemingly embarrassed. "Right. Let's move."

Together they clambered back on Deidara's clay bird and took off, but there was an odd feeling in the back of his mind. _Something's bothering him... a lot. And nothing ever bothers Sasori._

"Why did you have to destroy so much of the forest."

"It just needed a bit of remodeling, don't you think?"

"Those trees took over a hundred years to grow, but you got rid of them in less than a moment. I don't like your 'stress' relieving methods to much. You need to finder quieter ways to display your frustration."

"I wasn't frustrated!"

He heard the puppet body roll its shoulders in an artifical shrug. He refused to ever think of the puppet as Sasori... he didn't really know what Sasori was, but the wooden limbs and face hair wasn't him. It freaked him out at some points, but he had done a good job of not letting it show.

 _Him and old man tsuchikage are the only ones I ever worry about getting angry. They could kill me..._

"Forget about the forest, hmm," he said flatly, keeping his anger in check. "How are we going to go about luring Kakashi in? We can't just waltz in there and take the jinchuuriki, he's-"

"He's just a boy," Sasori cut in dryly. "Don't tell me he's got you frightened?"

"No, I'm saying we should be careful about this!"

"We're the most powerful shinobi for miles," Sasori scoffed. "No one is going to dare put a toe out of line against us."

Deidara ground his teeth together to prevent himself from giving a retort. _Fine, I can play tough._

"Just relax and take us to the village. No one is going to get in the way."

XXX

 **Other**

"Zetsu."

"Tobi."

He pointed up to the sky, where a large bird with two lumps on its back could be seen travelling quickly through a haze of smoke.

The black and white creature nodded curtly. "It's them. They're trying to lure Kakashi Hatake out by going after his student, the Nine-Tails jinchuuriki."

"Deidara didn't have enough of a beating?"

"He seemed fairly hesitant."

"Then that is the choke point to look for." He pulled his hood over his head, looked at the mask in his hands for a quiet moment before gently slipping it over his scarred features.

The Akatsuki spy took a questioning step forward. "You're going to go in yourself? That's risky."

"Didn't I say it was time to do things myself? Besides, it won't be me going to meet them, it'll be Tobi."

"Neither of them seem to like you a whole lot," White Zetsu said hesitantly. "What's the guarantee that they'll listen, or even not attack you?"

He didn't reply. It wasn't as if Zetsu had any feelings to offend by leaving him there. The Mangekyo flared in his eye, and he was gone.

"They grow up so fast," White Zetsu sighed.

XXX

 **Sasori**

They stopped at a tailoring shop on the outskirts before going into the village itself. Time was precious, so he sent Deidara off ahead to monitor the boy, or if possible, find Hatake himself.

A while ago, before he had joined Akatsuki, he had come to this village in search of a particular shinobi to add to his collection of human puppets. The fight had devastated the countryside, but oddly enough, when had returned a week later to actually collect the body when his poison had finally killed the man, he had found this odd shop being built right in the place of the battle. It had turned out that the ninja had been holding a choked on the populace. The man had been so happy with the change he had decided to built his living upon the spilled blood.

He opened the door, wondering if his appearance would throw off even this grateful commoner. But it quickly became clear this was not the case.

"Mister Sasori? Is that you?" From behind his desk, a visibly aging old ma with wispy hair and dark glasses stepped out.

"It is. I need some new apparel. Can you supply?"

The old man nodded happily. "Oh, it's so good to have you back! I recognized your footsteps, but I couldn't actually believe you were coming back! I'll get you something, of course. Something easy to move around in, I presume?"

He nodded, but the man gave no reaction that he had seen. He stood idly to the side, staring at something off to Sasori's side that wasn't there. After a few more moments, Sasori said, "Yes, that would be preferred."

"Then I will fetch you my finest ware. And please, before you go, remind me to give you my gift to you! I have stored it away for a long time." He watched as the old man, who's name he had forgotten, shuffled shakily off to a room behind his desk. He took his time to walk around and observe more of the fancier clothes available. Precious materials like silk, velvet, and cotton was woven delicately into fine shapes, all hand crafted with prices that would make Kakuzu's eyes bulge.

 _All beautiful creations by an expert craftsman._ He smiled thoughtfully to himself. _Sounds very familiar._

Something caught his eye. One of the suit's wasn't limp like the rest, something was giving it bulk. It stood off to the side, away from all the rest, and he approached it. It was the most handsome one of the lot, a rich dark with a single red rose flower in its front pocket. He reached a hand over and ran his hand over the soft fabric, and was met by a soft _creaking_ sound.

He blinked. _That sound._

What came over him, he didn't know, but in one fluid motion he had completely torn the suit off the puppet that was acting as a mannequin. It was as he thought. _Rocksplitter._

The puppet had been one of his favorites in the past, but had been critically damaged in his fight against the shinobi, and he had left it here. And this man had had the audacity to touch one of his works-?

"I had kept it here as a gift for you. I did not mean to antagonize you so." The shopkeeper had returned, Sasori's outfit in hand, a gray jumpsuit of sorts that looked normal except for a small red scorpion on the right shoulder blade, his symbol.

"How did you repair it?"

The old tailor laid his clothing on a chair, then sat down himself. "I spent a good deal of years analyzing the mechanics," he said tiredly. "But I wasn't good enough to do it myself. Luckily, a trio of Sunagakure were returning from some sort of mission gone bad from Konohagakure, some three years back. One of them was a puppet master, and in return for giving them a place to rest, he fixed up your puppet."

Sasori was hardly listening. _Someone was good enough to repair Rocksplitter. Another prodigy in the art of puppetry, in Sunagakure. What... what was this? Was this another emotion, another abstract human thing? I cast this out ages ago! What's wrong with me!_

"I may have lost my ability to see years ago," the old man interjected hoarsely. "But I can sense you are troubled. Please, forgive me. I did not wish to stir unhappy memories from your past. I only wanted to thank you-"

"I didn't need you to do this for me! I could've come back and done this myself!"

The old man was taken aback a moment, then smiled thinly. "I wanted to help, it wasn't necessary that I did. You gave me- no, gave _all_ of us, freedom when we had none. My thanks is unbounded."

"This puppet master boy," Sasori interrupted coldly, bringing his turmoil in check. "What was his name?"

"I never asked, but he had distinctive purple markings all along his face. In fact, I believe his sibling became the most recent Kazekage! I've met a celebrity when they were just a normal man, funny to imagine that."

The Akatsuki shook his head. The death of Kazekage at his hands wouldn't take a lot of time to spread, and he wondered what this innocent old man would think of him then.

"Thank you for giving me the clothing I desired," he replied shortly. "I'll leave you some money on the counter."

The old man made an effort to stand up, wheezed heavily, then sat back down, waving his hand. "I have no need for your money," he said brightly. "This is free of charge."

"Then the suit I tore off Rocksplitter then."

Pause. "So that was the one you ripped?"

"Yes."

Pause. "I'll accept your payment for that. It was an object I had hoped would stay around much longer... but I suppose nothing is meant to last forever, is it?"

Sasori eyed the tailor up and down. He had been a more youthful, springy man when Sasori had come to the village and involuntarily rescued it. Now he found himself being repulsed by the age in front of him. _He certainly wasn't meant to last forever._

"Goodbye."

"You will not take your puppet?" the man asked.

He was seriously considering it, but now was not the time to delve into the past. Besides, it was tainted by the touch of another puppeteer, it was no longer pure and of excellence. Furthermore, it had already proven to be a failure; it no longer had any use.

He allowed his silence to speak. The old man somehow understood, and he managed to stand up and give a slight bow. "I hope you can visit one more time before I pass," he said pleasantly. "Hopefully one where we can talk and enjoy each other's company, instead of you having to go so quickly. I wish you luck on whatever it is you are off to do."

What made him reply, he didn't know. It was the same strange instinct when he had almost allowed himself to take the attack from Granny Chiyo from the two puppets; a sudden act of kindness.

"I think I would like that." And he meant it.

He practically hear the man beaming behind him. He opened the door and almost immediately bumped into a new customer entering the store. He didn't say anything, simply swerved around them for courtesy's sake, carrying his new clothes on his shoulder. The stranger didn't acknowledge him; like him, he was determined to follow whatever his objective was.

Within his wrist, a small vibration. He unlocked it and saw that Deidara's little communications clay pigeon was trembling. A sign of trouble.

 _Can't go five minutes without a break. At least this means he's found either the jinchuuriki or hopefully Kakashi himself._

With him dead, maybe these odd feelings would stop.


	5. Chapter 5- The Artist in his Habitat

XXX

 **Deidara**

On top of the hotel roof, he lazily lied back against the rim surrounding the ceiling. He had effortlessly gotten to the top. Of course the hotel staff had seen him, and the trio that had come up to confront him were now scattered sufficiently around him.

 _I get watch duty while Sasori goes and buys himself some clothes. This Akatsuki lifestyle just gets more and more entertaining, hmm._

He lazily turned his head to look in the village square. There were three Konohagakure shinobi at a security kiosk, where they were arguing with a single Kumogakure-nin who seemed to lack his traveling papers. Next to them, a commoner was selling fresh fruits and vegetables to a group of travelling tourists. Sitting on a bench was an old man feeding pigeons, while a group of kids watched with glee.

 _So boring. Where's the action, the thrill? This is why staying with Iwagakure was such a waste of time... there's no excitement!_

 _But still... those were nice times._

He yawned before allowing his ocular lens to zoom in on a shock of yellow hair that suddenly peeped around the side of the bench, but it was only another boy. He watched as he startled the old man, causing him to drop his bird feed all over the ground. The pigeons exploded into frenzied movement while the children shook with laughter as the old man stood up and shook his fist at them. He failed to make a grasp for the blonde boy, who laughed wickedly before running over to his friends.

"You're getting to slow, old man!" the kid taunted back at the pigeon feeder before turning a building corner and disappearing with his friends...

 _"You're starting to get slow, Lord Tsuchikage."_

 _"Quiet, Kurotsuchi. It's just an exterior wound, I'm fine, resume your training!"_

 _She sat down stubbornly on the ground. She was a beautiful young girl, he had had her eye on her for some time. Plus, she was strong. That's what happened when you were the granddaughter of the Tsuchikage, you got strong fighting blood. "You're injured, we should stop. Here, why don't you take a seat?"_

 _The old man looked at her suspiciously, but his back abruptly gave a loud crack and he exhaled. "Yes, maybe that's not a bad idea." He floated over without a care in the world, sitting on the rough stone ledge-_

 _Her eyes found his, and he felt his stomach somersault as she gave him a mischievous wink. "Feeling better, Grandfather?"_

 _"Yes, yes, now try the Terraform Justu again-"_

 _He leaned up to the old man's ear. "I think she's got it down pretty well, don't you think, hmm?"_

 _The Third jumped/floated up to a foot in the air, his hands whirling around to probably do that incredibly jutsu of his, but instead they clumsily fumbled about in alarm. "Damn you, Deidara, how long have you been there!"_

 _"Long enough to see you're just as old and weak as ever, old man. Your reaction time is about the same as a snail at this point,hmm."_

 _Off to the side, Kurotsuchi snickered playfully. The Tsuchikage whirled on her high in the sky. "And you! Is he who've you been running off with now, instead of coming to training and honing your skills!" The old man ground his teeth in frustration as he descended down to her eye level. "This is no time to be playing with boys, girl! As long as the other nations are around, there can be no room for messing around, you must become strong!"_

 _"But Deidara stopped showing up to the training sessions to-"_

 _"He is not my granddaughter! Besides, he is a natural prodigy, one of the most skillful Iwagakure has ever produced." There was pride veiled deep in the old man's voice beneath his resentment, and Deidara cocked his head smartly. The feeble old man turned to look at him slowly. "He learned a lot from me, before he got his head full of stupid ideas of what made the world 'beautiful.' But maybe, just maybe, if he grew some brains, he would return and learn more to finally become my heir!"_

 _Kurotsuchi stepped forward, her voice pleading. "Grandfather, please, it was just a joke-"_

 _He dropped his smile. "I don't have anything to learn from_ _you, 'sensei'_ , _" he said lowly. "I surpassed you a long time ago. Hell, I should be the one teaching Kurotsuchi now, not you. Just roll over and die and let us really show those other nations what a real conflict is, instead of playing games in the dark,hmm!"_

 _Onoki was in his face in an instant, the glance of warmth in his voice gone with cold dismissal. "You're just as stubborn as ever," he snarled in his face. "I may be old, but I am still the Tsuchikage of this proud shinobi village, and that makes me both your elder and leader. Go back to playing with your clay figurines and gloating over us while we work on something that truly matters!"_

 _He did not mean to, but his anger was paramount. He wanted to show the old man he was wrong. He raised his curled fists, then opened them for them both to see. The old man and Kurotsuchi gasped._

 _"That's..."_

 _"The Iwagakure Forbidden Kinjutsu, yes," he said proudly. "With this, I truly do surpass you, old man. My 'clay figurines' now have real power, I am the most powerful shinobi Iwagakure has to offer now, hmm!" He looked over at Kurotsuchi smartly, expecting her to be looking at him with the admiration he had sought for so long. To his surprise, she was looking at him with a deeply shocked expression._

 _"So... it wasn't enemy shinobi who broke into the vault it seems," the old man said quietly. "It was my own former pupil. Who else would have had the code or skill to break in? And so you broke one of our most sacred laws and used the Material Animation Kinjutsu on yourself. For power." His voice was so disgusted that Deidara found himself flinching away. "You have fallen, Deidara. Instead of taking the time to gain your power, you took the quick route. You have disgraced us all!"_

 _He shrugged, trying to keep his voice modulated. Everything was going wrong, hopelessly wrong. They were supposed to be happy for him, she was supposed to love him now! And he,_ he _was supposed to accept him back. No more of those lectures, no more of those sad looks when he spoke of going out on his own._

 _Why is no one ever SATISFIED-_

 _Deidara shoved the old man back, and his strength said the old man tumbling through the air. He stopped right next to his granddaughter. "I don't need either of you," he spat angrily. "I don't need this village either. I have found the secret to life, the secret to change! Something you two or anyone in the God-forsaken village ever understand. I'm leaving, and I'm never coming back!"_

 _The Tsuchikage landed delicately on the ground, and he spread his hands. Deidara laughed openly. "You're gonna kill me, hmm? Think you can do it, old man?"_

 _"I don't want to have to hurt you, Deidara, but if you threaten my village, my- no,_ our _\- home, then you leave me no choice!"_

 _"Deidara, don't," Kurotsuchi pleaded desperately. "You're ill, there's something wrong, the kinjutsu meddling with your mind, I don't know! Just don't go-"_

 _He looked at her a moment, his mind fumbling with something with something to say. Had he really loved her once? Had he ever truly known what that even was?_

 _The old man saw him hesitate, and a bright beam of light lanced out of his palms. In an instant he was up in the air on a clay bird, the two watching him with open mouths._

 _"YOU STUPID OLD MAN!" he yelled savagely down at them. "YOU FAKE BASTARDS, I'LL KILL ALL OF YOU, I'll SHOW YOU REAL FUN-"_

A crushing blow struck him in the head, awakening him from his daydream. He had fallen from the roof; his whole body had been shaking and moving about in his throes. e had fallen straight to the ground, and as he painfully opened his eyes, he saw a small crowd had assembled around him.

"Hey, buddy, you alright?"

He knocked the hand away, standing up and dusting himself down. _That was a trip down memory lane I never want to hear about again._

"Sheesh, fine. Have it your way, asshole." The crowd dispersed quite quickly, all of them returning to their duties. He looked around, heavily self-conscious and blushing from embarrassment. He considered destroying the entire marketplace, to save him from knowing people had seen him in a moment of weakness.

This time, he recognized him. Namely because he was staring back at him. The only person left from the crowd, a teenager with lightning colored hair and black claw-like marks on his cheeks. A popsicle was poised halfway from entering his mouth. His blue eyes were full of shock as he took in Deidara.

His embarrassment turned into bravado, and his mouth curled into a leer. "Well would you look at that. I caught myself a fox."

XXX

 **Sasori**

When he saw the plume of smoke rising from the center of the village, he left behind his casual walk and took off sprinting, drawing out a puppet scroll along the way. They had to capture the jinchuuriki while he was still in his form, or he would destroy the whole village.

It wasn't that he cared for their actual lives, it was more he didn't want to lose the gratitude they felt for him.

He reached the village outskirts, where the villagers had begun to crowd in fear. He approached a shaking man and gripped him by the shoulders painfully enough it snapped his attention away from Deidara's fight.

"What's happening?" he asked calmly.

"There's a man, a blonde man, he's attacking this boy, I don't know him-"

He released him and the other fell to the ground, still trembling. _These people don't know violence, they're used to a drab reality. They can't handle a little bit of destruction._

He took off deeper into the village. None of the buildings were towering over him, but they still shaded him from his view of what could be going on. He reached an alley and decided to make his start here. He unrolled the scroll and set it down on the mucky ground, tracing his hands around the summoning symbols.

He slapped his wooden palm down on the scroll, and the smoke of the summoning greeted him. This was one of his more recent creation, an offensive wooden machine that he had experimented with using sealing jutsu. He expected Deidara to subdue the jinchuuriki, and then he would do the tying up.

 _Leader can't get mad at us, and I lure in Kakashi. There is no compromise!_

A colossal explosion rocked the house on his left, and the foundations groaned in protest. Abruptly, they gave up and the house collapsed in earnest, coating them both in dust.

"...can't keep running forever, kid! Sooner or later you're gonna have to witness my art, hmm!"

The _pitter patter_ of sandals on tiles rummaged to Sasori's left, and he lanced out with chakra cables, hoping to at least cause the jinchuuriki to stumble for Deidara to smash him. The boy, whether through pure luck or he somehow anticipated his attack, jumped into the air above the shimmering blue cord, and landed on the opposite house.

 _Quick on his feet, but he doesn't have anywhere to run. Unless Kakashi is already here, and he's waiting for a moment to strike._

Instinctively, he looked behind himself, expecting to see the hated silver-haired ninja standing behind him. There was nothing there, and he shook his head angrily. _Calm down. Catch the boy, lure the man, kill him. It's not something I want, it's something I_ need _to do._

He jumped up, and the puppet followed, now attached to him through chakra strings. The boy was jumping rooftop after rooftop, and above, Deidara soared a little ways behind him, raining down explosive clay creatures without abandon. Sasori's enhanced eyes could make out the laughter each time a structure blew. _Glad someone's enjoying themselves._

The puppet lurched forward with a twitch of his finger, and with another gentle nudge, it extended it's arm, fingers splayed. He followed the boy's movements. _He's trying to go that chapel tower, to get some ground to try and gain enough height to attack Deidara._ His whole hand dances rythmetially as the puppet's hand shifted to follow the boy like a sentry gun.

 _Going... going... going..._

 _..._

 _There._

The entire arm shot off like a cannon, shooting at top speed towards a single wooden strut on a building. It tore through it like it was cardboard, a moment after the boy landed on the same roof.

In an instant, the sudden extra support on a beam that was no longer there cause the house to fall on itself, and the boy vanished in a plume of smoke and debris. He ran over as Deidara sent down more clay figurines-

 _"You idiot, we want to keep him alive, not blow him to pieces!"_

The fallen house lit up like a firework, vaporizing chunks of concrete and lighting up anything flammable.

 _"Damn you, Deidara-"_

 **"Multi Shadow Clone Jutsu!"**

From within the smoke, hundreds of figures suddenly darted out, dissipating the haze with the sheer amount of numbers. All of them were the jinchuuriki, and together, they were throwing each other at Deidara and his bird in the sky, as if they were being launched by catapult.

Deidara weaved through the sky, dodging what he could and exploding what he couldn't. He didn't seem to have heard anything of what Sasori had said.

 _This is what it's called when someone has to much fun._ His eyes scanned the epicenter of the clones, trying to pick out the real one for his puppet to latch onto. But there were simply to many clustered about, the sheer amount overwhelming the amount of explosions Deidara could produce at a time-

 **"C2 Curtain Bomb!"**

Sasori's eyes widened, and he jumped with his puppet a few buildings away.

In the middle of the assembled clones, a shimmering blue light was emitting. Some advanced justu, with incredible chakra shape. _I don't think I've seen anything like it before-_

From above on his bird, Deidara sprayed his hands, and the sky seemed to darken. Realistically, it was hundreds of clay birds, their wings folded out. They covered the sky, shrouding them in temporary darkness with only the lights of the fires to let them see. The clones faltered, standing their ground and looking up with awe. Oddly, he couldn't see the blue chakra ball anymore...

"I've had enough sketches and drawings!" Deidara shouted down madly. "This time, this whole village is going to be my canvas!" He clasped his hands together, and for a moment the world was still in anticipation.

At the same time, the birds dive-bombed and the clones all jumped, and somewhere in the middle, a searing orange and red haze lit up the village.

Sasori shut his eyes. Even though they couldn't be damaged, it still gave his inner core a deep rooted pain to stare at something so bright.

When he opened them, he saw that the resulting shock wave had flattened that entire section of the village. Only a few metal beams still stood, and a few cracked segments of pathway. A few clones, not immediately killed but rather had been stunned, were on the ground unmoving, slowly popping out of existence one by one.

 _Impressive that Deidara could summon that many clay birds, no matter how small, in such a small amount of time. Still, that'll be his limit._ He smiled to himself. _Maybe I've been underestimating him to much._

The ground directly beneath the still hovering Iwagakure rogue shattered, and Sasori had the sensation that a volcano had erupted beneath him. But no, the orange and yellow clothing and hair-

 _He saw what was happening and hid himself underground. And the jutsu-_

The clones were holding each other by their ankles, swinging themselves around like a human rope. But at the very top of it, standing out among the unified color, was that blue chakra ball-

 _Now I remember. The Rasengan, the jutsu created by the Fourth Hokage. Amazing he was able to master that form of shape transformation. I doubt even I could go to that level._

Deidara heard and saw the boy to late, and the Rasengan struck the tender underbelly of his bird, causing it to ironically explode with him on top. Sasori darted forward, the puppet dancing ahead of him. He made it stop and threw himself in the air on top of it. The puppet retracted it's remaining arm, and as soon as Sasori was falling into the right position, shot the arm forward like a spring, launching Sasori through the air. In a moment, he had caught the falling dazed Deidara, and they were standing on the other side of the village.

"Sasori...?"

"You shouldn't have been playing with him, you idiot. Now you've gone and got your right arm beaten up." To further compliment his words, the disgusting hand on the arm coughed up blood, and stuck out its tongue unhappily.

Sasori got up, turning to face the sound of someone dropping a little ways next to them. The jinchuuriki stood there, breathing heavily.

"You two... again... you're the ones who killed Gaara!"

Sasori remembered his eyes blue and warm. Now, they were red and sharp. _Anger brings out the fox's chakra. It's now or never._

"The Akatsuki wants you alive, as do I," Sasori replied calmly. "You are a valuable asset to us both."

"Oh yeah? And what's the difference between their goals and yours?"

"Well, they want to suck that little fox's soul right out of you for the sake of the Leader. Me, I have something more personal to do with you."

"You bastard, I don't even know why I'm bothering to listen to you! I should kill you both for what you... you... you _monsters_ did to Gaara!"

Sasori shrugged, bringing his hands together delicately. "You should talk, kid. And hey, didn't I kill your friend Sakura to? She didn't die quickly either. In fact, she's still alive, slowly being killed by my poison. I spent years perfecting it, by the way. To test the limits of the human body, to prove how fragile it was. Your friend was strong, but in the end she proved just as expendable as the rest-"

The boy ran forward to quickly for even him to react, and his fist broke off his left arm. With his right, Sasori clasped the boy's arm around the elbow and brought it sharply up. The jinchuuriki screamed as his elbow snapped, and Sasori brought him around and threw him back in the direction he had run from-

-into the open chest of his puppet, which he had silently guided over. The jinchuuriki landed with a grunt inside it's stomach, and he immediately ran over to it. He closed it and then pressed his hand to the center, where he applied his sealing tag. Now, it's chakra was being repressed and he wouldn't have the strength to break out of it. For a couple of seconds, the furious captive banged against the tough wood, but it's strength quickly ebbed away, and then there was quiet.

"Good work, Sasori my man, hmm." Deidara limped over, clutching his wounded arm. "Now that we got him, what do we do?"

Sasori went to his shoulder and ripped away the section bearing his red scorpion insignia. "We leave them a message as to who took him. They'll have a tracker with them, and they'll trace our chakra to our destination. From there, we wait for Kakashi to come, and we kill him. That's all."

"We're still going for Kakashi then, instead of taking this kid back to base? Like the leader would want?"

"To hell with the Leader. This is more important right now."

Deidara laughed. "You seem a little agitated, hmm. Something spook you?"

He glared back at his blonde fool of a partner. "Get us a bird, art boy. I'll show you where were going."

"Sure, just take it easy."

"I'll take it easy when he's dead. Now, shut up and get flying."

 **XXX**

 **Other**

He threw broken tailor down, stepped out of the wrecked shop without a second look. He was certain that had been Sasori leaving the shop, but had he confronted him then, his cover would have been blown. Unfortunately, the tailor had been a useless pile of adoration and unhelpful information. His genjutsu would kill the man in a few minutes for his failure to supply him with answers.

The cool air rushed through his cloak as he stepped outside, as did the smell of...

He looked at the village and smiled from behind his mask. "Somebody's been cooking up a storm."

He was closing in. All he needed was a little scrap of evidence to find out where they were going, and then he would be waiting for them.

Akatsuki was his, not Nagato's. He would use use its members how he wished. Sasori was marked to die, and if Deidara resisted, so be it. Both were expendable to the cause.

It was time he took the cause into his own hands, no matter who barred his path.


	6. Chapter 6- Betrayal and Arrival

**XXX**

 **Deidara**

Somewhere inside the border of Sunagakure, Sasori told them to come to a halt. They unceremoniously dumped the body of the jinchuuriki in a deep pit, which Sasori quickly placed under a barrier and had a creaky puppet stand guard over it.

The rest of the installation was enough to make Deidara forget his earlier rage.

It was a sandstone mountain with a building carved into its hard features. Four pillars and a small door in between the middle gave the only signs of there being an artificial presence. Countless years of weathering had created the mountain and the caves inside, and yet as Deidara walked inside the cavernous workshop, he came to have a heightened respect for Sasori's ability to warp it in only a few years.

"This was my first workshop after I left the village," Sasori explained as he sat behind a massive iron table laden with limbs. Behind him, six enormous cabinets with countless drawers big and small filled the wall. "We won't draw the Leaf here for fear of them damaging it somehow, but I needed time to rebuild my army-"

He drifted off. "And?"

"And time to think." He shrugged his wooden limbs in an exhausted way. "There seems to be a lot to think about all of a sudden." He gestured widely around the workshop. "I don't care if you touch anything, just don't break it. Or if you'd rather have a go at trying to blow something up outside, it doesn't matter to me."

"How long will we be here, hmm?" _This place gives me the chills._

"The sunrise tomorrow. We'll lead them to the Valley of the Lost, and crush them there."

"The name sounds fun."

Sasori began tinkering with two puppet limbs, breaking open little wooden pallets and prodding what was beneath. The arms jiggled with near-human like appearance. "It was where those who had gone mad from the Second Shinobi War were sent to, when the warfare was at its most barbaric. The village thought they were weak-minded, so they sent them there to die. Little did they know it's just the frailty of the human mind at play."

Deidara sat back in a wooden chair, folding his arms behind his long blonde hair. "You know, you're technically human still. You can't just talk like that because your flesh is wooden now."

The puppet master didn't reply, and Deidara knew why. He was lost in thought, his full attention given to the suddenly shaping puppet. More bits of wooden were being put together, making a leg, and then two gears were stuffed inside its upper thigh where it connected to a torso. His arms were moving rapidly, so much Deidara closed his eyes to relieve himself. He heard the clicking and clacking of the wood being placed and held together, and then those sounds were replaced by the gentle strokes of a paint brush.

He opened his eye suddenly. _This is what he thinks of art, this is his passion. As a fellow artist, I must be attentive._ He leaned forward and watched as Sasori painted the fingers of his puppet a dark brown hue, and then laid white and black across a set of three eyes. A few seconds later, a tall and lean puppet was complete, strewn across the table.

Gingerly, Sasori placed a hand on its chest. "And now..." he breathed. His fingertips glowed blue, and he raised his hand. Chakra cables ran from them and into the puppet. He twitched his finger perhaps a centimeter, and the whole puppet jolted upright, standing upon the table. It looked over blankly at Deidara, making him draw back apprehensively.

"Do you like it?" the red haired outlaw asked, his voice full of satisfaction. "Why am I asking, of course you do. What's not to like about it?"

Deidara shrugged. "It looks fine, hmm."

"Fine, fine?" Sasori was seemingly outraged. "Go outside, clay boy. It's not like you understand the art of longevity to begin with. Go study a bomb or something."

He shrugged, deciding not to work up the normally calm puppet master. "Fine. Have fun playing with your dolls."

" _What did you say?"_ A puppet arm flew within a hairs breath above his head and shattered against the wall. Deidera looked over in surprise, suddenly feeling the air grow tense. Sasori was standing up behind his table, his new puppet falling back lifelessly across the table. "Listen here you little clay shaper, your art is _nothing_ special, anyone could do it. If you hadn't been selfish and taken your village's scroll, you would be nothing, and you know it!"

The anger was so alien Deidara couldn't quite find a retort. He stood up and held an arm in front of him hesitantly to ward off anymore flying limbs. "What the hell is wrong with you, hmm?" he finally shouted when he found his tongue. "You're always so quiet, and now you're just all over the place! Your gears out of place or what, hmm?"

For a moment, it appeared Sasori was going to shout again, or maybe even activate his puppet. But no, instead his eyes seemed to widen a fraction of an inch, and he fell back into his chair. "It's nothing," he said heavily but calmly. "It's just the nerves of battle."

 _That_ s even worse. He was never nervous about battle. Sasori never seemed to care much for Deidara or his well being, but Deidara had grown to respect his colleagues skill and his personality as well.

And right now, there was something very off about him.

XXX

 **Sasori**

He tinkered with thee puppets over and over again. Each drawer behind him possessed endless supplies, precious wood from the Hurtgen Forest, hand crafted ceramics from only the most selected makers. Puppet limbs that had been disassembled and recycled. The cave was his main base, his real home. Granny Chiyo and the girl had done devastating damage to his elite hundred puppets, a feat that still astounded him.

So he worked endlessly. He did not sleep, there was no need to. His false eyes glazed over the sixtieth puppet while Deidara's snores echoes from somewhere. Not one of his puppets possessed an imperfection. Before the night ended, he would decide which ones got what weapons, and would then douse all of them in the vat of his special poison. His army would not be falling next time.

But on the eighty-third puppet, he found his fingers dancing erratically, and he froze in shock as his wooden finger scraped along the torso of the being on his table. He fumbled for a blemish remover, but as his fingers closed around the bottle, it slipped out of his trembling grasp and splattered on the ground.

He stood up and flipped the 500-pound steel worktable, sending the puppet and components flying. Deidara gave a particularly loud snore in recognition, but carried on sleeping regardless.

 _What's wrong with me?_ He thought furiously as he looked at his wooden palms. _These emotions... never before have they been so pronounced. I had them tucked away for so long, why are they emerged? My invincibility is slipping away, my humanity returning, I can feel it!_

He began to pace around the cave chamber, listening to the rustling wind howl outside. A sandstorm was brewing, but the jinchuuriki would be relatively safe under the guard puppet's gaze in his pit.

 _Could it have been his friend, the girl? And Granny Chiyo? Some sort of curse mark they left on me to disrupt my focus? No, she couldn't have touched my Core, I would have seen it! Or some strange medical ninjutsu cast from afar that struck my body? No, it doesn't make sense. What is it then?_

The answer was already in front of him though. There was no way to deny, not even logic was a sound reasoning here.

 _The past, when she brought them out. It's always the past._

When his parents had been killed by Sakumo Hatake, he had been a boy. Their deaths had shocked him into a a depressed, crying boy until Granny Chiyo had showed him the art of puppetry. It had then transformed him into a cold, calculating master of others. Humans were fragile, his parent's deaths had told him that much. He thought he had removed them from his mind.

 _The Mother and Father puppets. She kept them and used them on me..._

Seeing their remarkably similar faces had frightened him, though he had not shown it, had given no sign of caring. But the old wounds had been opened, deep in his Core that relayed his last shreds of humanity.

And now it was relaying those emotions of when he was the hopeless child. Rage, confusion, and revenge, and he couldn't contain them like the past.

 _We are the next generation. Kakashi and I. Both victims of what our parents left behind, even if they had no control over what happened. Sakumo followed orders, and my parents fell victim to them. Yet, their blood calls inside us, I can feel it still. A rematch must be had-_

He turned around and turned an old, dusty oak wood cabinet. He didn't bother with the lock; he ripped it from it's hinges. Inside were four scrolls and one pure black, ebony wood puppet arm. In one swift movement, he had removed his left arm and dropped it unceremoniously to the ground. Delicately, he took the ebony arm from it's stand and clicked it into place on himself. Though he could not feel any of it happening, a rush of satisfaction and eagerness rushed through him.

In another quick movement, he snatched Blade out of the compartment on his right arm and grasped it tightly with his new arm. This one was twice as flexible with a near 360 degree rotation, meaning his sword arm could strike anywhere at anytime. It was crafted from a lone ebony tree that had grown out in the desert miraculously, probably fallen from some long merchant's pouch over a coincidental underground aquifer.

Sasori did not believe in luck, as it was to unreliable and defied logic. However, his desire for rare and unique objects was a great sense of satisfaction for himself, as evidenced by Blade.

With his foot, he kicked his old arm into the air and swung Blade around twenty-seven times in six seconds, slicing up the arm into multiple wooden pieces that clattered in a funeral march on the floor. He set his weapon back in it's slot, and carefully took each of the scrolls and placed them in the slots on his spine compartments. The fourth he kept in his hand, for the last act.

 _I have to do this now, I have to relieve myself of the past now or I can't return. These feelings have to be killed_ now _, by taking out Kakashi. The unspoken blood feud ends today._

Deidara snored again, his throat vibrating throughout the caverns. Sasori narrowed his eyes in the direction. _And clumsy clay boy has no meaning to be here or be apart of our feud._ He stretched out with his chakra to one of his puppets and attached it to its head. He puppet moved silently into a guard position in the middle of the hallway, and he set it in place.

He looked out over towards the rest of the puppets placed neatly around the workshop, gesturing wildly with the fourth scroll in his black hand. "Now for the rest of you..."

XXX

 **Deidara**

He stretched his arms, yawning. Through a little slit in the cave, sunshine bathed the rough cave floor. He got off his hastily made cot of his own clothes and got dressed quickly. He noticed a mirror in a corner and gave himself a wink.

"The group may suck, but I really do look good in these robes, hmm."

He went to go into the hallway-

And jumped back as a volley of darts shot past his face by an inch. His reflexes saved him from moving forward anymore. The darts hot past him as he fell back on him bum.

"SASORI!"

No reply. However, this time he heard a distant clacking of a puppet.

"Sasori, very funny, but put it away, that nearly got me you idiot!"

Still no reply, just the distant clicking of components in a puppet. "Sasori?"

A full minute passed, and he came to an infuriating conclusion.

"You son of a bitch... _YOU LEFT WITHOUT ME?"_

His shout echoed eerily to himself, resounding against the rough stone walls. How long it had taken for weathering was an unimaginable process that bored him -it was to slow. Now-

He stuck his left hand in it's pouch, felt it take a bite of the soft clay. _Crunch, crunch..._

 _He thinks I can't do anything, he has to go do it by himself. He doesn't trust me, just like the Tsuchikage didn't. Nobody trusts me to do it right,, doubting my strength, hmm..._

The second hand spat out a clay figurine, an odd looking creature with only distant human features of eyes and appendages. It ambled into the hallway and was greeted by multiple darts. Deidara's lips curled angrily as he guided his masterpiece forward towards the shooting puppet. He kept it moving until it got to Sasori's own art. He stepped into the hallway, unable to resist his own power.

Sasori's puppet was shooting still, perhaps a little more desperately somehow. But his own figurine was wrapping itself around the puppet, absorbing it bit by bit, until after just a few seconds, there was a large white ball of clay.

 **"KATSU!"**

The clay ball exploded in a blinding orange haze, and the whole mountain trembled from the C2 detonation. When Deidara opened his eyes, large chunks of the wall were either torn away or blackened.

He ran down the hall and outside into the morning. The pit was of course empty, but still seeing the evidence that Sasori had actually left infuriated him even more. For a moment, he even considered blowing up the entire installation, just to show the puppet master he wasn't someone to be cast aside...

"Hey, Deidara, heyyyyyyy!"

His fury turned into disbelief. "Uh... you again?"

"Deidara," Tobi breathed extraordinarily hard. He doubled over, still choking for oxygen. The orange mask heaved up and down.

"Tobi, how did you find-"

The wannabe Akatsuki member held up a finger, stopping Deidara mid-sentence as he collected himself. Deidara shut his mouth for some reason, and his face reddened as familiar anger returned. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"I came to... ask you where... Sasori was..." The orange mask abruptly straightened up, and Deidara looked intently into the single eye hole there. "He's not here, is he?"

"No, he left, the stupid, idiotic, self-centered little-"

"Oh man, oh man!"

"WHAT!"

"Deidara sensei, he's in grave danger!"

For some reason, hearing the man call him "sensei" gave him gratification, and he found himself tolerating the oddball failure of a shinobi a little more. "Danger? From what, hmm? He's a capable guy."

"Zetsu scouted ahead- there's a large Konoha-force waiting for Sasori, it's not just Kakashi Hatake! When he announces his location, he'll be heavily outnumbered, and it might be the end of him!"

Tobi's perfectly concerned and almost tearful voice was beginning to win Deidara over from his earlier assumptions. "It's a trap, then. The self-centered idiot, he had to do this alone. I _knew_ there was something wrong with him, and look where it's led! He'll die if we don't find him." Another thought struck him, a slightly less warm one. "Wait, where did you find out we were going after Kakashi?"

"Zetsu," Tobi said gleefully. "He has spores on all of you to keep track of you, remember? Safety reasons I'm sure."

"Right, hmm. Just slipped my mind."

"Yes." Tobi watched him, seemingly waiting for something. Deidara was likewise waiting for him to say where Sasori had gone.

"Tobi!"

"Yes?"

"You said Zetsu has spores on all of us, then bring him here to find out where Sasori's gone!"

Tobi scratched his ruffled hair in a frustrated way. "Well, you see Sasori's spore was on his left arm, and for some reason he left that behind in the shop here..."

Deidara sighed. "Right when I thought you were getting useful."

"Wait! I think I know how we can find him!"

"How? Tell me, you idiot, instead of just making dramatic delays!"

Tobi put his hands forward and mimicked a puppet master playing on stage by controlling puppets with strings. "You still have that little puppet Sasori gave you to act as a distress beacon?, dontcha?"

"Yes, but that won't help, he won't acknowledge it if we use it."

"But I can trace his chakra! Watch, give me it."

Deidara handed it, interested in how this seemingly abymissal failure would prove to track Sasori over countless miles. To his disappointment, Tobi turned around to do something to the puppet. A few seconds later, he pointed eastward. "He's taken off over there. Some sort of valley that I passed earlier."

"The Valley of the Lost," Deidara remembered. "That's what Sasori called it. Let's hurry over, before he gets lost in there too."

"Oh, we'll find him, I'll make sure of it," Tobi said almost too cheerfully. "It's just what happens after that that remains to be seen!"


	7. Chapter 7- In the Valley of the Lost

**A thank you to all the reviews, favorites, and followers so far, every author likes to know there's interest in what they write!**

 **XXX**

 **Sasori**

The Valley of the Lost was a fitting ambush location for Kakashi to walk into. He would become lost in there searching for his beloved student, and when his hope had dwindled down to nothing, Sasori would strike and kill him there.

And he knew Hatake was coming. He had seen the bond of student and teacher all to many times, and Kakashi had already lost two students. He would not sacrifice a third, it would be the human impulse to rush and protect, even if it defied mission orders.

His riding puppet, an elaborate hazy brown chameleon that blended in with the yellow sand, finally brought him within reach of the twin peaks of the valley, the only real entrance into it. The valley was said to have been forged in a titanic battle between two warlords during the Warring Period, a time before the Shinobi Villages and chaos had been the supreme leader. It was just an empty wasteland with a small, lone oasis standing defiant against the sandstone ridge-line. Now, bandits and marauders used it for ransom exchange locations, and Sasori was counting on the Leaf shinobi to learn about this and follow instinct.

He continued going, leaving behind a scroll-summoned sentry puppet slightly hidden behind a pile of rocks. It would sound a silent alarm to him when something large came into proximity of the entrance, and he would be able to pounce.

Pounce on his weak prey. He was the master, the one in control. Kakashi would seem join his collection of human puppets, he had a feeling.

Walking along with nothing but the scrolls he had grabbed from his cave and the jinchuuriki, he finally brought his puppet to a halt after three r of trudging through the valley. The oasis was meters from him, and he was counting on Kakashi tracking the chameleon's footsteps to the oasis. He dumped the boy off on the grass poking out of the ground, stepped down himself. His Akatsuki cloak rustled around him in a cold breeze that he couldn't feel, and his eyes gazed directly at the sun high in the sky.

 _It's all to familiar, from when they exiled him..._

 _..."No, wait, it's not my fault! They couldn't have been stopped, not even the Kazekage-"_

 _"That's enough, Rojo. You were found cowering in your tower, and for the sake of the conflict at hand, it was a single man. One man took three lives, that of your fellow guardsmen, and the two of Sunagakure's best puppeteers."_

 _"But it was the White Fang, one of their elite saboteurs! What chance did we have to fight him, a shinobi of his rank, it's NOT FAIR-"_

 _His voice was drowned out by the outraged cries of the crowd._ Sasori looked down at his hands in surprise, and was shocked to see smooth, youthful skin that were slightly wet with his own tears. Still, his body did not tremble as a result of his inner turmoil, instead his shoulders shook as a sob rocked him. It occurred to him that he was in some sort of dreamlike state, and he fought to draw himself out of it, but could not.

 _The booing continued, as did the man's frantic cries. Finally, a man with a shock of pale red hair stepped forward, whom Sasori immediately recognized as a much younger Fourth Hokage Raza. However, he was not dressed in his garb, and behind him, Sasori saw instead the Third Kazekage gazing impotently at the guard who's failure to raise the alarm had killed Sasori's parents._

 _"You know the law, Roji. Go into the Valley. I'm sorry, but you must."_

 _"R-Raza! No, you wouldn't be the one-"_

 _"Don't make it worse for yourself. You've cost us dearly... and made one poor child an orphan. I can think of no way to salvage your position. Go into the Valley, find the oasis if you can. If not, be doomed to wander and die. This is your fate-"_

 _"RAZA-"_

 _"As decreed by the Council of Elder and the Lord Kazekage. You have your sentence."_

 _Rojo fell to his knees and tried to grab Raza's leg for support, but the future Fourth's face was stone cold, and he kicked the man in the face and sent him sprawling on his back towards the mouth of the twin peaks._

 _"Burn brightly."_

 _"NO-!"_

 _The crowd surged menacingly, and Rojo cowered to the entrance, the shouts seemingly physically pushing him away._

 _Young Sasori hung back, watching the man responsible being steered to his end. He felt a hand drape over his shoulder, and looked up his still weathered grandmother. "There, there, Sasori," she said, her voice cracking only slightly. "Justice has been done, there is nothing more to do. Let's head back to the village-"_

 _"What about the man who actually killed Mama and Papa? Did they catch him?"_

 _Granny Chiyo breathed through clenched teeth. "No, they didn't. He got away. Think nothing of him anymore, dear child."_

 _"But the village law is one life for another-"_

 _"He is not of our village," Chiyo said aggressively. "As much as we would like to see justice taken to that extent, it cannot be done, Sasori. Release that revenge from your mind, you will not go chasing after that man." Her voice softened as she looked down at his undoubtedly furious and confused face. "Sasori?"_

 _"Yes, grandma?"_

 _"How would you like to learn puppetry? What your parents did best. You can carry their memories and their work, and clear these dark thoughts from your head."_

 _He brightened immediately. "Really? You'd teach me?" He wiped the tears from his face, hook them to the sand. "I... I would love to grandma."_

 _"Let's go back to the village, dear boy. I can start teaching you today."_

 _A thought struck his young mind. "Granny?"_

 _"Yes?"_

 _"Can I ask you just one thing?"_

 _"Of course."_

 _"What was the name of the man who killed them. Please, I want to know."_

 _"I told you to forget about-"_

 _"I have a right to know!"_

 _His glee was not of being able to carry his parent's work. He was being presented with a way to avenge them entirely, so their spirits could be at peace instead. Whether Granny Chiyo could see this or not, young Sasori didn't care. His eyes were gleaming unnaturally as he looked up to her, hungry for the answer._

 _"His name is... Sakumo. Sakumo Hatake. Now wipe his name from your mind, dear boy. I'll teach you your puppetry and you think about building your parent's legacy with you own, okay?"_

 _"Of course, Granny Chiyo. Let's start as soon as we're back home."_

 _There won't be any need to cry then-_

He gasped, his wooden mouth coming apart as the dream was interrupted by a final scream from the exiled Guardsman Rojo-

No, that wasn't it.

His breast was quivering as the sentry puppet reported movement. And lots of it.

 _He didn't come alone... did he convince whatever squad he was with to come with him? Or is it someone else..._

It occurred to him that it might not even be Kakashi Hatake at all, and he felt panic fight against his calm exterior. He ran a hand across his face in exasperation, then realized how weak and confused he probably looked and thrust his hand down. He closed his eyes and tried to feel outward with his chakra. He was no tracker or sensory ninja, but his control often allowed him to get a scent of his prey.

But whether the distance was to great or his panic was still unraveled, he could not detect anything. In frustration, he turned on the unconscious boy lying by the oasis and kicked him ferociously. The boy was still under an induced serum Sasori had injected into his shoulder, so he instead flew like a ragdoll into the oasis, face-down. Sasori considered rescuing him, but decided not to as the body stayed oddly limp...

 _There's no air bubbles._

He ran onto the water, his sandals skimming across the surface. He held up the boy by his throat and squeezed, but instead of hearing the snapping of his neck, there was a plume of smoke. His unblinking eyes stared through it in disbelief.

The log fell onto the water with a _splash_ and rested there innocently. He continued to stare at it, still not believing he had been deceived by a child.

 _How did I not notice it? A simple substitution, and I didn't realize it, how?_ His core was whirring around inside him like a hurricane, analyzing anyway his sophisticated and enhanced mind could have miscalculated, could have made such a crucial error...

 _There's just no way, there's no logical way. It's just IMPOSSIBLE! Someone must have switched the bodies before, but who, and WHEN!_ He kicked the water in fury, looked around for something to vent his anger, something he had never had to do. He was acting very Deidara-ish and some part of him was recoiling at this locked up segment of his body. The human side of him was emerging, but it was the worst part of it, not pleasant at all. There was no one out here in the desert who could understand or listen to him, no one he could even kill.

He looked over at the chameleon puppet, looking for some sort of recognition, but its blank gaze greeted him instead. There was no life in the puppets he had tried to substitute for life.

For the first time, he was acutely aware of being alone.

Sasori lumbered over to the chameleon puppet and leaned on it heavily, taking in quick, shallow breaths even though they had no function in his form. However, it no longer mattered; he was caving in to the human instinct of fear.

 _Deidara... where's Deidara?_ Left behind at the base installation, with no way of finding him. Now, there was a group of people on their way to attack him, their only objective to kill him. He had been misled by a boy and Konoha was closing in on him. No backup. Just him and his puppets. Ordinarily, he would have not been so concerned, but his invincibility as the lifeless machine was a distant thing now. The shock of loneliness had shook it out of him, and now the shock of defeat was going to seal it away for good.

Around him, the landscape seemed to shiver. The sand seemed to shake lightly, and he focused on it intently.

Something was coming.

"Show yourself, Konoha shinobi," he called stiffly, holding his head up high and proud. He held his fingers splayed in front of him, his eyes darting around for sudden movement. He was shaken, but that did not mean he would kneel over and die for his attackers. He would take as many as he could with him.

"Come on, come on!"

Dead silence. The sun shone directly above his head beating down in anticipation.

He put a hand down onto the sand, trying to sense their location through chakra network. _Where are they..._

 _There... but there's only one chakra signature, the rest...what is that?_

His answer arrived as the sand erupted around behind him a semi-circle. He whirled around and caught the first attacker by its furry throat-

 _Fur?_ The sand was thrown into the air but he still saw clearly through it. _It's dogs-_

A massive boarhound drew down on his arm that was holding the little rottweiler, and it clenched his arm firmly in its shapr draws. Countless other dogs were bearing down on him now, dragging him down to the ground with their weight. Some he threw off, one he managed to stab with a dagger peering out of his wrist socket, but there were perhaps two dozen. They grabbed all his limbs and held them tight, effectively immobilizing him. He shrugged furiously, trying to loosen their teeth. _Summonings... they're all wearing Konoha hand-bands..._

"Alright, Akatsuki, where's Naruto?"

He stared blankly. There was no way-

"Talk, Akatsuki," Kakashi Hatake demanded again, his kunai shining sharply in the sunlight. "You won't leave the desert alive, but you sure as hell will tell me where my student is before your body hits the ground."

 **XXX**

 **Other**

"How much further, Tobi? What are we even looking for?"

"Just keep going in this direction!" he called joyfully over the roaring wind. "Look for two big sandstone peaks that open up into a sandstone chasm thing! That's where he'll be!"

"Alright. Tell me about this large group of shinobi closing in on him, any names?"

He racked his memories, pulling for names of the real past for the fake invention he had used to draw in Deidara. "Uhhhh... Asuma Sarutobi... Might Guy... Shikaku Nara... Hayate Gekko... yeah lots and lots and lots of them!"

Deidara nodded, then turned his head towards him. "Wait, I heard that last one Hayate was killed a while ago."

 _Is that right?_ "Well , I'm only going off from what Zetsu told me!" he said sheepishly. "Blame him!"

"So were walking into a potential trap and Sasori doesn't know shit. How come you haven't sent Zetsu ahead to warn him! Dammit Tobi, you're practically useless, you know that?"

"Oh, silly me, it slipped my mind! To late to bring Zetsu over anyways. Besides, three full fledged hardened shinobi should wipe the floor with whoever they send!"

He had no doubt Sasori and Kakashi Hatake would fight and wear themselves out. He would kill whoever was still standing and then, based off of Deidara's reaction, would decide who returned to Zetsu's fabricated story that he was spinning for Nagato.

 _The tragic loss of some Akatsuki members under unfortuante circumstances. We did what we could, but Sasori could not be saved. And as for Deidara..._ he looked over at the flowing blonde hair and the determined look on the young man's face. It was an unshakable desire to help, no matter what might have caused him grief in the past. It was a sense of duty he himself had been victim of in the past...

And that only gave him the final resolution.

 _And Deidara was killed trying to protect his partner. A sad but valiant show of criminals finally having a bond in the end._

"I see the twin sandstone mounds, we're closing in."

"Yay!"


	8. Chapter 8- Dance with the Devil

XXX

 **Deidara**

They flew past the high reaching sandstone peaks and into the depths of the yellow desert. His scoped eye zoomed in and out of the landscape, searching for that elusive mop of red hair. Beads of sweat coated his forehead from the undying heat, but he wiped it away in a hurry.

 _Where did you run off to, you idiot..._

"Deidara sensei-"

"Do you see him?"

"No, I wanted to know-"

"Keep quiet, Tobi, and keep looking, hmm."

He did not really know why he was suddenly so intent on Sasori's well being. The man had left him behind on numerous occasions, and even when they fought together Sasori had abandoned him for sake of the mission or protecting a cluster of puppets. He owed the puppetmaster nothing, but somewhere, beneath the surface of his pride and narcissism, there was the trace of an older Deidara that cared about someone, just like he had with Onoki's granddaughter once.

 _We have to find him and help him. He can't die out here in the land he hated so much... no, he'll live to fight another day._ He looked back at Tobi to find him looking back at him, and he flashed the mask a grin. _We all will._

XXX

 **Other**

 _There's something different about than when we met outside the hideout. Is it that he's maturing, growing past that insufferable pride of his? Or is he just filled with even more overconfidence?_

He couldn't see how Deidara could suddenly be so warm and endearing towards Sasori all of a sudden, who according to Zetsu had been nothing but a nuisance to the Iwagkaure rogue, nothing more than the cool bully and loud outcast on the school playground.

The more he saw Deidara's transformation, the more he saw bits and pieces of the old Obito shining, with the same desire to help and protect their comrades.

And the more he saw it, the more he felt the need to do it now. Not just because having this new, mature Deidara on the battlefield would prove troublesome, but it was almost painful to see.

XXX

 **Deidara**

He heard movement behind him, but when he turned it was only Tobi playing with the alarm puppet. He looked at the Disgrace of the Shinobi intently, wondering what he was doing. Somehow, he felt Tobi was watching him, and an uncomfortable knot formed in his stomach. He turned away again, but stuck his hand into the head of the clay bird, his fingers digging in the soft mess. Hating himself for what he was about to do, he pressed his index finger forward slightly.

"Do you see anything yet, Tobi?" he asked.

"Not yet, Deidara sensei! I'm still searching!"

Some more quiet silence as the sun hit down on them. Then: "How did you use the puppet to find Sasori's location? I can't imagine there being that powerful of tracking jutsu to trace residue chakra when he hasn't touched it in two years."

Tobi stopped playing with the puppet and his hands instead froze around it, one seemingly clenching the neck. "I have some neat methods," he said slowly, his bright tone perfectly secretive. "I could show you them, when we've rescued Sasori."

"Why not do it again? Just to be sure we're on the same path, hmm."

"We're going the right way, I know it, sensei, I'm using the puppet right now to hone in on his chakra! Just keep going straight and we'll see him soon!"

"But are you certain? I didn't even see you do any hand seals."

"Don't you trust me?"

There was something in Tobi saying that he didn't like, and his fingers tightened inside the birds head. _This feeling won't go away._

"I trust you, Tobi. I'm just worried about Sasori."

Tobi shivered. "I know. Just keep going straight."

"Your tracking jutsu on the puppet says so?"

"Yes."

As quietly as he could, he let his palm inside the bird's head take in an intake of clay.

XXX

 **Other**

His hand laid the explosive tag flat under the roof of the puppets mouth. At that same moment, his Sharingan saw a sudden concentration of chakra manifest in Deidara's hand, which he cursed himself for not realizing it had been inside the birds head.

 _And that's not the only thing. He's changed the flight path; the air current is different, and the sun has shifted to the left of the mask. He's caught me in the lie._

"Tell me something, Deidara sensei," he said loftily in his fake tone. "Ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight?"

Pause. "What?"

He tossed the puppet at the clay sculptor, and instinctively Deidara caught it. At the same time, his hand jolted around in the bird, and it flipped upside down.

But he was already disappearing into the realm of Kamui, where his 'guest' was lying in wait.

"Tobi-!"

"Just like Sasori said, Deidara. You're the type that dies young."

XXX

 **Sasori**

"I'm not going to ask again, Sasori," Kakashi repeated, holding the kunai to his left eye. "I know that's your name, Sunagakure has kept good records on you over the years. They'll be thanking the Leaf after I've disposed of you."

Sasori laughed. "They don't know anything about me. Not even my partner does."

"So your partner survived his self-detonation back in the woods then?" He cast a watchful glance all around, including the sky. Sasori took the opportunity to analyze the dogs holding him in place. The smaller ones he had no concerns of them causing him damage, they merely stacked up in areas and had a firm grip. But an enormous black bloodhound was beginning to crunch down on his left shoulder joint, causing faint cracks that would disable his ebony arm if the pressure continued. He relaxed and returned his gaze to Kakashi as the other also focused on him again.

"If your partner actually did survive, he's nowhere near. What, you came out here by yourself?hat he could make one "

"You didn't think I could handle you on my own?"

"Of course not, I wouldn't even question confronting you head on, a shinobi of your reputation." Kakashi's Sharingan looked him up and down swiftly, as if searching for something else other than his next move.

Not that he could even have one. He was confused as to how Kakashi still thought he still had the jinchuuriki, when it was clear the boy had escaped. _How has he not returned to the Leaf yet?_

The kunai pressed against his neck, and he looked his captor straight in the eye. "I know you can't feel pain, or maybe you can't even register this knife pressing against your neck. But I do know I can have my dogs tear you apart and have your pieces buried under the sand like a bone."

Sasori did not allow Kakashi to see the mild worry bubbling beneath the surface. Using his chakra, he could rebuild his body almost instantly into working order if he was torn apart. It was the problem of separation of having a layer in between these parts that would be his weak spot. And if one of those dogs happened to bite down on his tender Core, there would be no recovery.

"I don't know where the kid is," he replied calmly and coolly. "Do you see him anywhere? Does your Sharingan?"

"You wouldn't have been stupid enough to actually bring him out here," Kakashi said evenly. "You have him hidden away. If you don't tell me where he is _now,_ I'm going to tell them to start ripping." In compliance, the massive bloodhound bit down a bit harder, and he heard a crack of wood to his disgruntlement. _The arms getting loose._

He bit back a retort, since he had actually brought the jinchuuriki out, or so he had thought. Then, he felt a sweeping change come over him, and to the surprise of both of them, he laughed at his predicament. He wasn't even entirely sure why he was bothering to laugh when it was very clear the dogs were going to kill him and this would be the end. It was just like when Granny Chiyo had almost killed him with his parent puppets, and a thought struck him like a knife in the neck.

 _There's no escaping the past, and the past is my humanity. Have I really been chasing a dream that could never happen, to be the ultimate machine? Even if I did kill Kakashi, there's no getting away from it. More things could return, and I'd be in the same place._

"Fine, I'll comb the desert until I find where he is, or until I find your partner. Either way, I'm finding Naruto."

"I don't know where he is, truthfully. I thought he had escaped; I was tricked by a substitution when I came out here. Where he is is beyond me."

Kakashi eyed him again, searching to see if he was lying. However, it was no doubt difficult to tell whether a human puppet would be lying or not. "Like a shinobi of your skill would be fooled by a substitution," Hatake scoffed at last. "Pakkun, do it."

"With pleasure," came a snarl at his feet. He adjusted his shoulder sharply, and the bloodhound bit down hard to keep hold-

-and he allowed his arm to fall off entirely. Suddenly, he was a lot lighter on his left side as both mutts and arm fell away. The dogs on the right staggered with the sudden end of equilibrium, and the final ticket came as the bloodhound's jaws slipped from his joint.

In an instant, he had sent a chakra cable into Chameleon from his stump, while he allowed his momentum to carry him to the right and onto the dogs. They released him to avoid being crushed, and suddenly he was a _lot_ lighter. He swept his right foot around and kicked the talking dog Pakkun and his comrades off his left foot, and he was entirely free.

At that same time, Chameleon had finished its stampede towards him, causing Kakashi to take to the air to avoid being trampled, and a few other mutts also scampered out of its way. Those that didn't he took out himself, including the massive bloodhound that he quickly shoved out of the way effortlessly. It landed roughly on the ground with a whine, then blew up into smoke.

He heard running feet behind him, and with his right foot he kicked the ebony arm into the air. Kakashi's kunai struck the tough wood and the contact caused the knife to reflect off. He spun around a full circle, and tried to land a punch on his head, where the impact would be enough to jolt the man's brain around and decomission him from the fight. Unfortunately, the Sharingan anticipated his move and the other ducked low and sank into the ground in an Earth Style maneuver.

The Chameleon was winning easily against all the dogs. The wood was tougher than the one Sasori used, a construction of Ironwood that could deflect shuriken with only a scratch. The dogs teeth and paws grazed the size before they swatted away like flies. One by one, they disappeared into smoke, wounded and howling.

Except one. "Gotcha!" Sasori whirled, expecting Kakashi. But no, it was the tiny one Pakkun and he completely misjudged his swing. The dog leaped for his face and gripped his eye in its mouth. Sasori swiped it away easily, but his whole right side went dark, and he knew the dog had taken the eye with him. Pakkun landed on the sand, sporting a broken paw from the swipe. However, as he glared over at the puppetmaster, he crunched the eye into little pieces before joining his brethren back in their dimension.`

He stumbled around, looking for Chameleon. The puppet stood still, its job finished. Sasori breathed a sigh of relief, then put a palm to the ground to try and feel where Kakashi had gone to.

 **"Raikiri!"** A fist of arcing blue light struck Chameleon in the underbelly and tore straight through it like tissue paper, splitting his puppet in half. By the time Kakashi had fully emerged from the ground, he could already see the damage to his creation was irreparable, the wood having melted to slag on contact areas.

"You don't cease to amaze, Kakashi Hatake," he commended. "That was one of my favorite puppets. I don't like to see them treated so harshly."

"I'll ask one more time," the jonin asked cautiously. "What did you do to Naruto?"

"I don't know," Sasori repeated, stooping down to pick up his black arm. He swiftly attached it back to his body. "But you're here now, my opponent. In the flesh, like the lamb let to the slaughter. I can't allow you to walk away now."

The lightning had died from the other's palm, but the readiness for combat was as present as ever. "What are you talking about?"

"Whether you know it, we share a blood bond. Your father slew my parents in cold blood. With him dead, you carry his name and therefore the burden of his murder." He pointed an accusatory finger at the man he loathed. "Just now I was debating whether I should kill you, because I was no longer sure whether killing you would even fix me. Their deaths changed me... but now I can conclude that yours will, too."

Kakashi shook his head as if he was addressing a child, and Sasori's anger ran down his arm, and Blade jumped out of the compartment in the ebony arm and leapt into his hand. "I don't know any of what you're talking about, but if this is true, it's unfair to pass what my father did down to me.

"I don't care. You are before me, and there is only one way to test my hypothesis." He cocked his head, let his unblinking painted eyes look into Kakashi's stern real ones. "You can't kill me. You'll die here, that's all there is. I will deny you the richness of life, just as Sakumo Hatake denied my own."

Sighing, the Leaf jonin pulled two kunai out and flashed them in a defensive position. "I already told you I can't beat you in a straight battle," Hatake acknowledged. "But you said yourself you had doubts on your hypothesis. Only one way to prove it, right?"

Sasori nodded, and allowed himself a real smile. "Let our parents look down and see who the real avenger is!"

XXX

 **Deidara**

Down, down, down. There was no way to break his fall, and he was so high up. The sand became a vortex coming closer and closer, spinning dangerously quick. He couldn't even bring one of his arms around to eat clay for another transformation.

 _He tricked me, that low-life. The puppet was rigged and he escaped using some strange jutsu. In fact, it looked uncomfortably like Kakashi Hatake's... what if they're in league? What if this was just a ruse to get me out of the way so Tobi- if that's even his real name- and Kakashi could kill Sasori? No, then why would Zetsu trust him?_

 _Just what is going on? Well, not that it matters. It looks like this is it, there's not a thing I can do about it now._

 _Except..._

The pouch was flying right by his neck. It was a gift, long ago in the life he had forfeited, from Lord Tsuchikage when he was student. A small pouch of clay that was supposed to have come from the Waterbowl, the only water source in Iwagakure. A small clay deposit had been found, created countless years ago.

 _A gift from the past... maybe it wasn't so bad back then. What would have happened had I not left, I sometimes wonder._ The pouch string around his neck flew within reach, and he bit the rope, began sucking it in. The pouch finally reached his lips-

 _500 yards._ He opened it with his teeth, and the clay fell out into his mouth.

 _Come on..._

His chakra furiously went to work. He was no perfect shaper with his real mouth, but if he could just...

 _250 yards._

 _A wing, no I can't. Jeez am I really this bad, hmm?_

 _150 yards._

 _No, I can't. Come on, come on!_

...

He spat out a half completed bird fifty yards from the rapidly approaching sand, and desperately clutched the unfinished side. The clay monstrosity flailed about, trying to fly, but it couldn't. However, the single wing was slowing the fall ever so slightly. The effect was a broken paper airplane with a rock stuck to it, but when he crashed into the sand, he was thankful for a bruised jaw than a broken neck. Breathing heavily, he got off the broken down bird and lay on his back, looking up at the perfectly clear sky...

 _Sasori owes me big for this. Agh..._

He could hardly move; the impact pain was tremendous. But the desire to protect his comrade, his friend, was undeniable, and he got to his knees, fed his hands into his clay pouches.

Plus, he now had a score to settle.

 _Forget Kakashi and his Sharingan, Tobi is the real problem here. Has he been leading us all along? I doubt there's an army anymore, it was just a ruse to get me to lead him to Sasori I imagine, or just transport there. Either way, it's time to act fast. Need to get to Sasori..._

 _...somehow..._


	9. Chapter 9- Sasori vs Kakashi

**Thank you again for all he reviews so far! I'm coming close to wrapping this story up, maybe five more chapters. But don't worry, two (hopefully) epic fights are inbound, and even better news, the first one is now.**

 **Enjoy!**

XXX

 **Deidara**

 _That's my right arm busted, snapped in two places, and it looks like my left pouch's clay had its contents flown out. This is not going to be a pleasant situation._

He had been walking in the direction he thought Tobi had said the oasis was, dragging his body along with him. The sand bit into an open wound in his right arm, and he had to fight to not look down at it. A piece of bone stuck out of his elbow, and right now trying to fix it with his head as scrambled as eggs was not wise. He had never thought he would hate anyone as much as old man Tsuchikage, but the hatred for Tobi was almost unbearable. Not only had the masked bandit outwitted him by being a fool, he had even escaped with whatever plan he had been manifesting.

 _Sasori doesn't know a thing..._ _I have to help him._

It was this determination that sent him walking for an hour through the desert, his tracks being swept up by the wind so that he would never even have a way to return home, if he had wanted. The bleak yellow surroundings were his only comfort, with the high ridged sandstone peaks that made the canyon on either side. On, on, on. There was nowhere else to go, anyways.

And on the journey, he became again became aware of a feeling that had been building up in his stomach since his battle with the Nine-Tails. The insanity of art was there, the instant of the explosion. But after that thrill, where there was the usual emptiness and dullness, there was something to replace it. Sasori's presence completed him, it gave him a day of assurance in addition to the second of the bomb. Their two arts _could_ be compatible, and he was living proof.

 _To think we hated each other at first, that we wanted nothing to do with each other and our methods. Partners forced together like oil and water._ He clutched his wounded arm, and clenching his teeth, he forced the bone back into his arm. Pain shivered up along his body, but it was only for a second. A calming presence filled him again, knowing his arm was at least slightly fixed.

 _When was the last time I felt happy about something when it didn't involve blowing something up? Was it the bond I shared with Lord Tsuchikage and Kurotsuchi, even the rest of the village?_ The more he thought about it, the more he felt that it was these bonds that were what truly made him feel complete. _Maybe Sasori was on to something about there being something right about making things last longer._

His footsteps began to pick up, carrying hid body rather than dragging it through the sand. He gulped air and set his face. _It's not that I have to help him._

 _It's that I want to._

His good arm swallowed up a mouthful of clay, and he concentrated his chakra. _Something good, something wonderful. Something that will be good, in the long run. Something that even Tobi would get stumped by..._

He fell to his knees, the pain ever present and his chakra sapped from his desperate gamble when he had fell from the sky. His face looked down at the sand, beads of sweat falling into it. He could imagine Sasori doing the same at the oasis, perhaps questioning where his partner was when he needed him. The thought of being alone, just your reflection staring back up at you for support...

 _A reflection..._

The answer was quite simple.

XXX

 **Sasori**

They stood facing each other. In the distance, Sasori could hear the telltale signs of a sandstorm brewing. They often did in the Valley, where the air currents would become trapped and swirl around and around until they developed into storms. Getting trapped in one of those wouldn't be good for his gears, that much he was willing to bet on.

Opposite of him, Kakashi spread his feet apart, obviously planning something. His eyes kept flickering to the left side, perhaps out of nervousness for something to look at.

 _Or there's something there._

Sasori grinned. "Seems were both a bit shy to start the show. Please, allow me to give you the first exhibition!" He quickly focused his chakra into his left leg, then stomped it into the sand. If something was there, the vibrations would force it up to avoid its chakra being scrambled-

The sand roared on his right side, a clone of Hatake jumping out with a kunai knife that was shoved into his side.

 _He made me think there was something on the wrong side, stupid, stupid move-_

In a swift motion, he had expertly locked the clones elbow and snapped it, then brought the rest of the swinging over his head so that he could smash it into the ground-

The clones dissolved into blue streaks of electricity midway above his head, and he felt his gears lock as electricity flowed throughout his body. The lightning then traveled to his core, and he gritted his puppet's teeth in reflex as unfamiliar pain clouded his thoughts-

 _Pitpatpitpatpitpat. I almost can't see him with my eye missing._ Just in time, he ducked, thanks to his left leg giving way to a mechanic failure, just avoiding Kakashi's outstretched arm. However, his leg followed lower, and Sasori's jumbled limbs couldn't react in time. The sandal struck him fiercely in the head and sent him stumbling back. He clutched at the ground for some support, his palm open, groping for something.

Kakashi was coming again, and his palm closed on empty air. The Leaf's approach faltered as he fell forward, the chakra string attached to his ankle sweeping his leg up from under him.

"Don't go charging into the situation like a genin!" Sasori taunted. The same palm broke apart into four squares, with a projectile launcher emerging from the center. Five poisoned senbon shot out, all aimed for vital spots. Sasori's aim was impeccable, there was no way he would miss-

 **"Earth Style: Mud Wall Jutsu!"** The sand opened up again, and a thick wall of earth came up from the depths of the earth. The senbon deflected off it harmlessly, but Sasori was already thinking of his countermeasure. He jumped back a few spaces as the wall came up, and brought his hands together in a single hand sign. He felt the miniscule weight of the scroll on his back vanish. He stuck Blade in between his jaws, then the ebony arm came apart in the same way as his other one.

In an instant, the splitting streams of water were pulsing out of both launchers, thin streams shot out at cutting speed. He brought his arms across in scissors, and the earth wall came apart in three pieces. However, just as he had suspected, Kakashi was not behind it anymore.

 _He likes to duck into the earth and then sent out a decoy to lure in attention, then attack while his target is distracted. An assassin's tactics, as well as simple ANBU protocol. He may have a Sharingan to anticipate my moves, but I can still infer his._

He put away the water cannons and took Blade out of his mouth. He scanned the sand, looking for a place for him to shoot up from. When none was forthcoming, he decided to test the strength of the ebony arm. With a one strong blow, he slammed the fist into the sand.

Immediately, Kakashi came springing out of the sand two feet away. A second after, the hole he had been burrowing in gave a hollow crashing sound as the gaps in the ground were filled in by the pressure vibrating through the earth. _f he hadn't jumped, his head would have cracked like an egg._ He swooped up Blade in the ebony arm and swung fiercely for Kakashi's head. However, the jonin blocked it easily, then sent him back stepping as he swung at all angles with a pair of kunai.

 _Why am I fighting at close range?_ Sasori questioned himself suddenly. _It's not by strong suit._ He brought Blade ripping at Hatake's legs, but to his shock the other actually landed _on_ his sword as it swung. Then, both kunai lit up in lightning, a tendril of electricity forming in between them.

 **"Raikiri : Lightning Transmission!"**

He held up his weapon in defense-

The ancient blade, if its origin was true, was made of a rare, tough metal. Nothing had ever so much as made a nick in it, and he had only had to sharpen it twice in their long history together. However, he could do nothing but watch as the crackling lightning forming between the two kunai pressed against the Blade and slicked through the upper half.

For an eternity he watched the upper half slide off the base, then fall to the ground. Kakashi's attack was still coming, aiming for his neck, which would do irreparable damage like it had with Chameleon-

His right arm extended tremendously and punched the Leaf shinobi in the head, sending him spinning away. However, he did not stop there. His hand clenched around his flak jacket and then bodily tossed him up into the air, then retracted. He just needed a moment to do what he needed.

The ebony arm stretched to his back and pulled out a second scroll, which he unfurled and allowed the air to brush it like a banner.

 **"Summoning: Janus Puppet!"**

The scroll burst into smoke, and out of came a large, towering puppet. Kakashi whirled in midair, coming out of his drop to land safely on the ground a few meters away. As the smoke cleared, Sasori was grimly satisfied to see his red eye widen.

"This is one of my favorite and most complex puppets," Sasori called softly, letting his voice travel with the wind. "You'll notice its three heads. Each one stands for a different stance it can take: slayer, sentinel, and a final, last resort technique. But the first two get what I want done, always."

"I'm flattered you care to explain it," Kakashi said tiredly, clutching his right eye. It oddly wasn't the side Sasori had struck, and he made careful note to keep a careful eye on Kakashi's moves. _There's something wrong about his stance, as well. Have to stop him before he gets a chance to do what he wants!_

He clicked his index finger and thumb together, activating the slayer mode on Janus. Instantly, the wrists split apart and rotating needle cannons came swiveling out. They instantly began firing, his eye following Kakashi's movements. The silver-haired jonin took to the air, darts of thin iron slicing after him. He landed back on the ground and danced, avoiding each one. The sand quickly became pointy and shiny with the amount of needles being fired. Sasori kept up the charade, but his left thumb was dipping down. This activated the left shoulder joint, and out came a duo of sharp blades, spinning rapidly. The left arm kept firing its needles, but the right one stooped and reached up the grasp the blades in their middle while the sword spiraled dangerously.

 _And... gotcha._ Janus swung the blades by rotating its wrist 360 degrees just as quickly as the swords. Its speed now doubled, the sword flew towards Kakashi in a second, determined to cleave him in half. And that they did; the sword speed caused it to bite into his back before momentum caused the other blade to slice into his stomach and saw him evenly in half-

His thumb met his pinky, and Janus instantly retracted its weapon and produced heavy plating from within it. It's face swiveled to a softer one, a artfully crafted female face with a nevertheless sinister look in its eye. The other two faces were covered by a thin iron helmet. Soon the whole puppet, was covered in a dense pale yellow plating: the sentinel mode.

The sand all around Janus blew up into four clones. He brought up his right hand an inch, his fingers waggling. His creation responded by the armor plating opening up into little slits. Thin spikes shot out at the clones and impaled all of them. Upon being destroyed, however, they all cascaded into lightning, which zapped Janus- to no effect. The puppet shrugged off the attack like it was nothing, and the plates solidified again just in time to deflect four kunai that came out of a fifth Kakashi, probably the real one. Sasori sent Janus rushing forward , and it struck Kakashi bodily at top speed-

Again, lightning enveloped his puppet. _He's doing something-_

 **"Water Style: Water Dragon Jutsu!"** The oasis trembled behind him, then a column of water with a monster's head emerged, shooting right for him.

 _He was buying time for the hand signs, that jutsu requires a lot of them. Damn, he's fast with his seals._ He brought both his hands up, and Janus bolted towards him. The dragon was quick, but Janus's armored body took the brunt of the force, being buffeted perhaps a foot back and the armor plating slightly dented, but otherwise the gears and mechanics inside it were unharmed. _Fast, but not as fast as me._

The real Kakashi shot out right in front of him, and he had Janus go back into slayer mode. Two poison-dripping kunai shot out of its throat, which Kakashi was forced to drop his surprise attack for to avoid. His hand was burning with electricity again, which could harm both Janus and himself. _Have to keep him away longer- ranged attacks._ He had Janus pop open its left shoulder socket and allowed the explosive cannon to emerge. It fired three rounds in quick succession, its entire clip. They littered the sand at Kakashi's feet, but he had already taken off into the air, once again aiming for him-

 _He knows short-range isn't my strength, just like any other puppet master._ "Keep away from me!" he snarled, disgruntled. He dropped the chakra cords from his left hand, then shot out some senbon of his own. Kakashi spiraled multiple times in the air to dodge, landing perfectly on his feet. He dropped fully to the ground to avoid Janus roaring above his head.

Sasori kicked sand into the other's eye, and Kakashi fumbled to regain his stance. Again, Janus was closing in-

"Just die!"

The Lightning Blade blindly struck Janus's left arm and sliced it off cleanly- as Sasori had hoped. His thumb spiraled, and out shot out a spray of toxic mist. Kakashi cried out as he inhaled the purple haze, and he wretched and fell to his knees, clutching his throat. Sasori had Janus ease itself to beside him, then he approached the weakened shinobi. "You shouldn't have come alone," he taunted. "You should have realized you're no match for the most powerful puppet master alive- what were you thinking? Thought it would be another easy ANBU mission?"

"Who... said... I... was alone...?"

Sasori took this in, then whirled, having Janus shoot off every single projectile weapon it had in a wide arc to hit whatever backup was arriving-

The air shifted behind him as he took in the bait,, and he realized Kakashi had taken to the air again. Janus was fast, but the distance to getting in the air like that was impossible, and now that he had shot every long-range weapon. And he was clutching his right eye again-

 _I have no choice._ He brought his palms together, and Janus changed again. With his remaining eye, he saw the third face swiveled forward, that of an angry god. The eyebrows were pitted downward, the eyes narrowed and painted to slits, and the mouth baring canine teeth. And it had only one attack-

His concept of worship was obeying a god for eternity, for wasn't that what a god was meant to last? But when its people turned its back on them, it would unleash its wrath. But without any worshippers, that god would die. So Sasori had convened the ultimate representation into art...

 _Taking a leaf out of Deidara's book... if only he were here to see it._

 **"Red Secret Technique: Performance of the Wrathful God!"**

His Janus puppet took to the air, pouring chakra into its feet to give it propulsion. In a few moments, it was up in the air with Kakashi, two meters away.

Then the last arm collapsed into the puppet, and then the legs. The torso followed, shrinking in on itself. Collapsing, folding, vanishing into the art of the blast. In three seconds, the head was all that remained. Sasori could not see it from his vantage point on the ground, but he knew the eyes had lit up into a bright orange, staring directly at its target.

"Goodbye, Kakashi!" he shouted. Then he had the ebony arm fold open into a miniature shield in front of his core.

The Janus Puppet exploded into a bright orange ball of chakra, not flame but visible, palpable chakra. It was small, perhaps the size of a watermelon, but in a few seconds, it would erupt into an explosion even Deidara would shed a tear for.

 _Look at me now, father, mother. Are you proud to see your son avenging your wronging? Can you take away the pain away now, cease your haunting of my soul?_

No response was forthcoming, so he shrugged and took the silence as an acceptance, though he felt that this was not the case. _Oh well. And... now._

 **"KAMUI!"**

The orange chakra ball blurred, then suddenly seemed to enter an aerial pool. Sasori watched, stunned, as it sucked in on itself, disappearing into a hole in the world. Then, with a final _pop_ , it was gone, sucked out of the world.

Robbing him.

Kakashi dropped down in front of him and slashed with his kunai, opening a gash on his left cheek. Sasori screamed, and Kakashi froze. His wooden ebony arm smashed Kakashi across the face, breaking the cheekbone and sending the other man in a heap to the ground. But again, the enemy that had again and again outsmarted him picked himself up from the ground.

"Why won't you die!"

"I could ask you the same."

 _"DIE!"_

The ebony arm clashed against the kunai, pressing up against it in a desperate gamble. However, Sasori desperation could not match up against Kakashi's determination, and the other pushed him off, breathing heavily but having won the standoff.

"What is it with you, why or how can you keep fighting?" he snapped out. "Is it some jutsu up your sleeve? Am I missing the hand signs, what, WHAT!"

Kakashi dropped to a knee, panting. His Sharingan was different, a unique shape Sasori had never seen before. _Is it a Mangekyo Sharingan like Itachi's? That would explain why he was clutching his right eye, trying to make whatever unique jutsu the eye carries. It seems like its power is to just suck things away, into, what, another dimension? Advanced jutsu, indeed._

He clenched his wooden hands into a fist. _But where does his energy come from? A desire to defeat me? Does he think he's defending his father's honor against my parents?_

"Even if your eyes no longer have life in them," Kakashi sighed. "The way you fight tells me you know the answer. You care about another person, and the desire to fight for them gives you strength."

Sasori laughed aloud. "You think I care for others? People are expendable, _I_ alone am eternal and unique. What makes you think I need to care for other people?"

"You talk like someone who knows pain... and like someone who knows being alone," Hatake said carefully. "I was the same, once. There was a void in which I felt only I was the only who could do something right, and that others were only apart of a mission or meant to be temporary. Then I found friends, real friends. People who cared about me and wanted to protect _me,_ and I saw their strength." He clutched his right eye, his hand trembling. "Even if they're not here to help me, knowing that they care about and want to see me again gives me the strength to fight on. If you're only going to fight for yourself, then you only have yourself to look forward to."

"Your philosophy is nonsense," the puppetmaster spat. "I don't care for anyone, no one ever cared for me!"

"Not even your parents who you're fighting to avenge?"

That made him pause, but his response was gloating. "They're _dead._ Do you know what happened to my grandmother, Granny Chiyo? She cared for me, and I killed her in cold blood. I have great strength, Kakashi Hatake. You have luck, but it's at an end here!"

"Then how was my student Sakura and an old woman like her able to match your power equally?"

"SHUT UP!"

"If you refuse to listen to reason, then maybe you are beyond help," Kakashi conceded. "Maybe you really have slipped to far away from being human to understand things like this anymore. If that's the case, then let's trade final blows right now! **Raikiri!"**

He scooped up the last half of his once proud Blade, and they both charged at each other at the same time, a final testimony to who's ideology was stronger.

"SASORI- WAIT!"

But by the time he had heard the last word, before he could deduce if it was a voice in his own head or that of his partner, everything was dark and there was nothing to feel anymore.


	10. Chapter 10- The Puppetmaster

**XXX**

 **Deidara**

The clay bomb couldn't reach the duo in time. He watched as Kakashi's Raikiri pierced Sasori's chest and rip upwards while Sasori's sword struck the other through his right shoulder. It was as if each strike had sapped the strength from each other, and they both collapsed against each other. A moment later, the clay bat reached them, but he didn't detonate it. Lumbering clumsily over to them, he knelt down beside them.

"Sasori."

"You... came... just to see me die..."

"You're not dying here today, Master Sasori," he grunted firmly. He pulled Sasori's limp puppt body off of Kakashi's pale hand, then dragged him away. The Leaf shinobi clutched at the blade piercing his shoulder then tugged it out, doubling over in anxiety. Deidara looked at the sword on the sand and noticed a different liquid than blood stained alongside it.

 _It was coated in Sasori's poison, hmm. He's going to die._

Sasori clutched his shoulder, drawing his attention back the other. A gaping hole where Hatake had run him through. For the first time, he noticed something other than wooden plastering. The ridge of some cylindrical device was able to be seen through the hole, oozing a murky red fluid.

Deidara swooned to one side, his head feeling suddenly light. _Is seeing his blood for the first time really making me like this?_ His eyes were blurring, and his head ached. Suddenly, it was over, he could think clearly, and once again the scenery was there. He blinked, shuddered, blinked again.

"Hey, what's..."

The puppet master, for the first time, seemed to actually be in agony. His grip was almost painful, and Deidara counted his blessings it wasn't his other, devastated shoulder.

"Sasori, what is that, hmm?"

"It's my... core... agh... his Lightning Blade grazed it.. can't move the left side of my body...AGH... I was desperate... to win... ERGH... careless and he hit me in... my weak spot..."

"How did he even know you had a weak spot? _I_ didn't know you had a weak spot, hmm!"

"It's because my Sharingan can see chakra flow," Kakashi spoke up tiredly. His voice was raspy, whether from exhaustion, the heat of the desert, or a side effect of the poision; maybe all three. "The rest of his body is an empty mass held together by very thin chakra strings, all emanating from his core. It wasn't hard to pinpoint it."

Deidara clenched his fists. "Sharingan..."

"Deidara... let it go..."

Sasori sounded so weak Diedara was almost unsure who was talking. But no, there was no mistaking it. Sasori was missing an eye, and his other one had various bits of paint chipping off it. In fact, his whole wooden face seemed to be deformed, sapped of its energy and power. He was beaten; by what, Deidara didn't know. Kakashi was on all fours, choking on no doubt a poison he had been hit with.

"Sasori, what happened? You didn't try to fight him on your own? You little idiot, hmm..."

But still the Leaf shinobi tried to talk. "Where... is... Nar...uto...? I have... to know... where... before I..."

"I don't... know," Sasori said flatly, not looking at either of them by peering up into the sky. His eyes had a glazed, disinterested look in them, as if suddenly the pain wasn't there. "I swear to you that is the truth."

Kakashi rolled onto his back, in agony from the information or the poison it was difficult to tell. The whole situation was reminding Deidara of his own fresh commitment to working with Sasori more diligently, and he shuddered. _Don't tell me that's what's going to happen to me next._

He shook his head. _No, Sasori isn't going to die._

There was a _click_ c _lacking_ beneath him Sasori was fumbling with the cylinder in his chest. "Judgement has come to pass on the god, it seems," he said in that same flat tone. "This damage is more than anything I can sustain. I only have a few more minutes, Deidara. Sorry that I-"

"Shut up, you're not going to die right when I've decided I would do anything to help you, hmm!"

"You... what?"

"I promised myself, I would do anything to help you out, no matter what befell you. I was coming to help already, and I swear this would've gone better."

"But what?" Sasori was almost crooning him, such a different tone that Deidara blinked in surprise. He looked over at Kakashi. He was lying on his back, staring up at the sky just like Sasori.

"But I was ambushed... by Tobi... he tricked me over here, he could be here any moment! Sasori, you need to get up, need to help! He wants something from us, something bad, I can't figure out what, but he's after you! He thinks I'm dead, but he doesn't know where you are, there's still time..."

 **XXX**

 **Sasori**

"Isn't it interesting to see how the weak can succumb to such a simple genjutsu?" Tobi inquired lightly. Sasori stared him down furiously, but the pain in his chest was almost paralyzing. Likewise, Kakashi seemed to stunned by the other's sudden appearance to do anything.

Deidara stood stock still before them, speaking random phrases from a conversation happening in his own mind. He had arrived and taken in Sasori's condition, but when the puppetmaster had reached to examine his wound and Deidara was captivated as well, Tobi had materialized behind instantly and subdued him. Now, the clay sculptor stood helplessly, unaware of his own predicament.

" _Sasori, what is that, hmm?"_

"What are you doing here, Tobi? What is the meaning of this?" Sasori broke out.

The masked villain walked around Deidara's talking statue. Sasori followed every movement to the tee, and he finally saw what the heart of all their problems were.

Kakashi had seen it as well. He did a double take, before grunting out, "Where'd you get an eye like that?"

"We can recompense the older days later, Kakashi," the masked man retorted harshly. He stretched out a hand and gripped the other by the forehead. Hatake struggled briefly, his fingers weakly trying to find the wrist bone to snap it. _The toxin is paralyzing him, he can't do it. Tobi waited for the fight to end and then placed Deidara under genjutsu to prevent him from intervening. All expertly done, with no lapse in his plan._

"Sleep," Tobi said harshly. Kakashi's eyelids closed on their own accord, and he slumped to the ground as well.

It was just them and Deidara's random speech.

 _"Sasori, what happened? You didn't try to fight..."_

"It's hard to believe someone as insignificant as yourself would prove to be such a stubborn thorn in the foot of my plans," Tobi said conversationally. He leaned against Deidara, casually looking down at the weakened puppetmaster with his lone Sharingan, visible through the eyehole. "I didn't think there would be anyone more stubborn than Konohagakure in preserving their identities in this useless world, but it seems I'm being proven wrong left and right."

"What plans are you talking about? You mean your intentions to join Akatsuki-?"

"I _am_ Akatsuki," Tobi corrected, and Sasori raised his eyebrows in mock surprise. "I encouraged Nagato- the "Leader" to you, to create this already defecting organization. A group of dysfunctional individuals with no ties or love for this world who would be stupid to realize their above-average skill was being manipulated."

Sasori's eyes widened with every word. He could understand boasting and bragging from a lesser individual, but Tobi's revelation of the Sharingan told him he was dealing with someone who had played a façade; whoever this man was, he definitely had some power.

And that meant his words couldn't be doubted, either.

Tobi began pacing, playing with a kunai he had materialized from nowhere. "I left things to Nagato in hopes he would follow my guidelines, and he did at first. But the moment _I_ try to join in on my own plan, it's rejected. By you, Sasori if the Red Sand, of all people. A man who's parents were slaughtered by the whims of a mission, and rejected his humanity because of it." He paused, balancing the knife tip on his finger. The mask bored into the metal. "You think you are the only one with such pain? You think you're the only one who could see it as unbearable?"

Deidara's words were fumbling; Tobi seemed to be losing focus on the genjutsu. His words were filled with some deep emotion Sasori couldn't begin to understand; he barely understood what he was being told right now.

 _We've been... manipulated? From the beginning... how, how could this happen? To me, to the rest of us?_

"This world disgusts me," Tobi went on, his voice ponderous. "You understand how cruel it is, Sasori, but you've only scraped along the surface. And look what that did to you, heheh. Your parents would've been so disappointed..."

"Who are you?"

The mask again paused. "I could tell you, but I won't. There won't be much point; you're going to die, along with Deidara, within a few moments. I only wanted to tell you how futile your existence, which you've valued to the point of obsession. To ruin the only thing you cherish... that is your punishment for almost ruining my vital plans. You, the esteemed puppetmaster, perhaps the best in the continent... the puppet to another. That is what you are, and that is what you will die as."

The kunai flipped in his palm, and it landed with an ominous _smack_ in his palm. "Words, however, can only go so far. You've heard poor Deidara's sincerity; even for someone as empty of empathy of you, this will hurt."

"No, don't kill him! Don't you dare, you damned bastard, you're insane, you're-"

"Empathy is useless, you were on a smaller version of what I plan to achieve: bliss of the pain in the world. But your arrogance earns you a full dose of how cruel the world really is."

The kunai sunk into Deidara's chest, and the words stopped flowing. Tobi pressed the knife deeper in, until he was wrist deep in the blonde demolitionist's chest. Sasori watched, horrified, as the head lolled, and then silence reigned in the midday light.

"The world is cruel," Tobi repeated quietly. "No matter what happiness you try to put into it, it will only cause hate!"

Sasori's eyes widened as his arm wrenched out of Deidara's body-

And as a thick white substance crawled across his arm and held it in place.

"What the-"

Deidara's body was losing color, turning into the pale white color of clay. Tobi tried to wrench his arm out of his body, but the white material was rapidly hardening on his wrist, preventing any movement.

 _Deidara, no way-_

"Don't you _ever_ talk to my partner that way, hmm!"

A human fist shot out of the ground and struck Tobi in the face, cracking his mask into multiple pieces. The strength of the blow sent him flying onto his rear, clay Deidar and all. Stupified, he landed face down, clutching his face.

"Sasori, come on, we have to get out of here!"

A clay bird blew out into existence. He felt Deidara grip him by his shoulders and help him to his feet, but the pain from the Core was unbearable and he couldn't work his limbs. He clumsily flung himself onto the bird and clutched it for dear life.

Tobi was getting to his feet. His other arm came down and smashed the hardened statue off his hand. Snarling, he began to turn, a hand seal at his fingertips. **"Fire Style: Bomb Blast Dance!"**

 **"C2 Repulsion Detonation!"**

The wave of approaching encircling flames was buffeted back by a small explosion that send out a powerful blast wave. It helped the bird animation take to the air, and then they were fleeing in the sky for dear life.


	11. Chapter 11- Reconciliation

**Thanks for all the reviews, makes me happy so many people are interested in the story! I promise I'll make it a worthy conclusion :)**

 **XXX**

 **Sasori**

The wound in his chest was threatening to make him pass out, an experience that terrified him because it had never happened to him before. The wind was fluttering through his hair and he imagined he could actually feel it touching his exterior. He could definitely feel it rushing through his core.

"Deidara... how did... you find us? How did you break the genjutsu?"

Deidara didn't turn, but from his coat pocket he withdrew the sensory puppet. "Tracked your chakra signature with this." His voice was tired and full of pain, he was in no better shape than Sasori was. "Tobi tricked me... he's been working against us. What he wants... what plan was he talking about?"

"You... heard all that?"

"Yup, the "Deidara" that first arrived was a clay clone all along. I used Earth Style: Subterrean Voyage and clung to its ankles underground while I steered it. I was hit by the genjutsu for a moment, but I used my trained eye to snap out of it. I was only waiting for a good moment to trap him and escape."

 _Wow... too think he actually pulled off a good strategy like that one, without my help._ His brow furrowed. _Have I... really been underestimating him?_

"I came here as soon as I could, but I broke my arm when I fell from bird," Deidara grunted. "My chakra is low, and yours is at zero. I don't know how we can hope to fight him. He won't stop until we're both dead."

Sasori groaned, rolled onto his back. "I can't... even move my body. It hurts so badly... this pain..."

"Hey, stop talking like that. I didn't just risk my life for all this to happen."

The puppetmaster wasn't really paying attention. His whole body felt like it was sucking in itself, and he just wanted to curl up into a ball and close his eyes.

 _You call yourself the puppetmaster, when you yourself were just a puppet to me._

Groaning, he rolled over onto his back. His wooden fingers brushed over the red liquid spilling from the core. The entire upper section had been decimated, and he wasn't sure was part of him had been erased. It housed the entire human body, all in one small cylinder. The damage was catastrophic, and he had never thought of there ever being a reason to think about what should happen if it was damaged.

"Sasori, look alive man, hmm!" Deidara's worried voice snapped him out of his daze. For a moment, the empty sky had seemed so promising, to just float away...

Through the air they went, with Deidara shouting at him every couple minutes, his tone sometimes faint in his ears, sometimes very pronounced. He couldn't really understand why someone could be so concerned for him, when he had never done anything for anyone except give them solace through death. But for some reason, someone kept telling him to keep his eyes open and stay awake, so he did.

After a century in which the sky had dissolved into a grainy blue haze, they dropped down at an abandoned farmstead. The crops had wilted away, the farmhouse run into ruin. A few wild chickens still roamed around, eating up what scraps they could, scavenging for some way to further their lifespan. Sasori watched them quizzically while Deidara limped into the farmhouse for whatever he could. He looked at his retreating back, folded his hands over his body.

His chakra was recuperating, he could feel it. However, the vital life systems in the Core had been damaged; the chakra was regenerating, but the internal functions themselves were broken. There was no fixing those wounds, even with the chakra available.

 _Just another adventure, isn't it? Just something to look forward to..._

But he couldn't shake the feeling that he had left nothing behind. There was no preservation of his body, he would be forgotten. His goals of lasting forever in this body would be swept away. Sunagakure would spit on his grave and rejoice in the passing of their most hated outlaw. There was no one to remember him, that was why he had fought so hard to stay alive, and make himself immortal.

The cold truth he had realized: no one would ever love or like him, and therefore would ever treasure him as so.

"Sasori! Sasori it's some medicine, just hang in there...agh... please!"

He turned back to the farmhouse and saw Deidara limping over to him again. The other kneeled by his side, his forehead studded with sweat at the labor and energy needed to move around. How much blood had he lost? Didn't he know he could die soon as well? And if so, why was he still fighting to save a dying man?

Deidara spread some sort of ointment on the open gash in the Core; to no effect, of course, since the Core wasn't even biological to begin with.

"Why are you still..."

"Shut up, hmm, just keep quiet and let me work on your wound..."

"Why are you still... helping me?"

Deidara's fingers trembled. He was no medical man, he only knew how to destroy with his hands. Still, he determinedly worked, not answering. Eventually, however, Deidara seemed to realize nothing could be done and he lapsed into silence, kneeling there staying at the Core.

"Why... try?" The words were difficult to eject.

"I don't know, alright! I'm just trying... to do something, hmm..."

The hopelessness of the situation was not lost on Sasori, and he suddenly found himself very afraid of dying. He had never imaged it possible, he considered himself so abstract from humanity now. His wooden hand found Deidara and held it, seeking some sort of comfort. iedara looked at it, then gripped it.

"You're not going to die, hmm."

"I am." The words only frightened him more, he surprised himself he was able to say them so calmly.

"Don't say that!"

Deidara's clay bird nuzzled Sasori's side, and he imagined that somehow it felt sympathy for the two, despite having no sentience.

The farmhouse soon stood behind the setting Sun, and the chickens fled inside to escape the night. Deidara was to afraid to move the puppetmaster anymore, so he continued to kneel there, bleeding freely as well.

"Bandage yourself..."

"Okay." He did so. The blood stopped, and the Iwagakure rogue seemed to breath easier.

It was a tense number of minutes until a familiar face offered them hope. Zetsu emerged from the ground next to the clay bird. "Hey! Heyyyyy!"

Deidara jumped. "Z-Zetsu? What are you- how did you get here?"

"Spores! My, you two look like you had a meeting with a woodchipper! He looked at Sasori's gaping wound with surprise. "How did that happen?"

"Zetsu, shut up about that," Deidara said hurriedly. "Go get help from the Leader, we need some advanced help here. And alert everyone about Tobi; he's the one who did this. He's trying to kill us, he's not who we think he is!"

Sasori found it strange Zetsu had no knowledge of Tobi's intentions, but he couldn't even form the words. Motor skills had failed him ages ago, and now he was truly going to become a lifeless puppet, on the strings of someone else. He could almost Granny Chiyo, mother and father, the Third Kazekage, all the rest of the people who had come and gone in his life waiting up there for him.

 _Was I a disappointment to them all? Maybe I won't even go up... maybe the puppet strings will snap and I'll fall down, down...down..._

"Zetsu, shut up about your stupid miscalculations and... ugh, tell them where we are!"

"Okay, Deidara, okay. Calm down!"

Deidara looked like he was about to explode, but instead his shoulders sagged and he slumped to the ground. "Just go... get help," he said weakly. He clutched his broken arm again, and it occurred to Sasori that he might not even pull out of the recent events either.

Zetsu left, and they were alone again. The clay bird seemed to get more and more sluggish, slow moving. Eventually, it simple fell apart into white clumps.

"Hey... Deidara..." he whispered.

"Shut up, hmm. Conserve... your strength. Zetsu's getting help."

"No, I need to... ask you..."

"What?"

"Why are you... so dedicated to... helping me...?"

For some time, during which the pain in his chest had lessened considerably and his vision grown even more groggy, there wasn't a reply. He began to think it was all just some strange dream, or that Deidara didn't know himself. Surely rogue ninja would never grow warm or care for each other; definitely not ones from Akatsuki, an organization darker than midnight. How could those that lived and desired to be alone ever want to care for another? It was only survival in the world, using others to gain an advantage...

"I guess... because I was tired of being alone." Sasori looked over at him in surprise. The blonde's face was tilted skyward, eyes closed. His arms hung motionless at his sides while his blood poured out. "After I left Iwagakure and went out on my own... I thought I was the only important one... and then I met you, and you were just... so much stronger than me. Your art was pure and devout, I wanted your respect above all. But... I suppose... I just grew to view you as someone I could talk to."

Sasori forced a smile. "How... touching at... the end..."

"That what?"

"That... we both found... that someone... to talk... to..."

Deidara opened his eyes. "You did?"

"Yes." He managed to say that strongly, put the meaning into it to let the other know.

"Then maybe we're not so...agh... so alone after all."

On top of the dismembered remains of the clay bird, a vortex appeared, and Sasori knew who was coming. But there was no longer any fear; he had gotten out what he wanted. He had felt human again, after countless years of trying to fight it. No matter what he did to himself, there was never any escaping any of it. The peace had sought for for countless years had simply been inside, locked up by the pain of the past. Now, he was content.

"What a sorry state you two ended up in," Tobi said, his voice almost pitiful. "Two great shinobi, to be lost to the ages."

"Rot in hell," Deidara managed to snarl.

"Why, I almost get the impression you don't like me."

"How did... you... find us?" Sasori grounded out.

"Zetsu. Since you're going to die soon, I'll just add to your suffering. He's not working for Nagato, he's _my_ spy. As I said before, Akatsuki is mine, and therefore is mine to control. You are all pieces of clay in the grand pot, but if you become to brittle or hard to work with, you are discarded." He withdrew a kunai knife from his sleeve. "Like now. But..." He looked over at the crumpled Deidara. "Some pieces could also be reused... what do you say?"

"You want me to join you?"

"Why not? You were originally supposed to, anyways. I need a partner, and if you both die then I'm an odd one out. So yes, get up and join me, I can heal your wounds and we can leave Sasori here to die."

Deidara looked over at him, but Sasori wasn't sure what he saw.

"Then I couldn't be more than happy to accept." He extended his broken arm to grasp Tobi's. The other seemed gratified and brought out his own arm to take it.

Tobi must've saw it a fraction before Sasori did, because at the last moment the mask tilted back in alarm and the hand tried to retreat. However, Deidara put on a burst of energy and grasped it tightly.

Firmly encasing the centipede in between their locked hands.

"I'll see you in hell!"

 _"You son of a a-"_

Sasori closed his eyes and let the inferno take him.


	12. Chapter 12- Shattering the Dream

**XXX**

 **Deidara**

The explosion did not rip off his arm, but instead broke his shoulder and wrenched it into the opposite direction. He covered his face to avoid the proximity burns, back flipping away from the brunt of the explosion.

He sensed a presence behind him, however, and with a grimace Tobi had already avoided the attack and slipped into a counterattack. _No way to stop my flip, or get another bomb off... not that even have the chakra to do another one._

Something soft struck his front, and his tired body didn't even have the strength to resist when his legs lifted up from under him. _What sort of jutsu is this... agh... he's taken control of my body, hmm?_

His legs outstretched into a long kick, which seemed odd. Tobi caught his foot, but his other came around to kick him in the head. The man, who's face was revealed to him after he had landed that devastating punch when they had led, gave a curse from his scarred features and the leg somehow fazed through his head. Deidara's eyes widened as he saw his foot pass through the angry face. _What's going on, hmm?_

His fist leaned forward to grasp Tobi's wrist, and the other released him in frustration, before leaping into the air to avoid another attempted kick. Deidara landed on the ground calmly, then looked down to see what had struck him in the chest.

 _Chakra cord... no way..._

But to his disbelief, they did in fact lead back to Sasori's wounded body, where his fingers danced melodically. His face was determined, and in it Deidara saw death, but also a still burning fire to fight.

 _He somehow has chakra to both feed into me and control me. I can feel myself growing in strength again, but until then, he can see the battle from afar and control my movements if Tobi tries to counterattack- like now-!_

Tobi suddenly materialized on his left, and Deidara got a good look at his face, and at the two Sharingan evident in his eyes. _So he's got a Mangekyou Sharingan, just like Itachi, except it's only in one eye, and it seems to allow him to teleport himself around, hmm._ He thought of how his kick ha passed through Tobi's seemingly solid body, and how he seemed to always avoid the explosion. _If it's anything like Kakashi's he can suck away certain things to another dimension. Cold he be doing the same with specific parts of his body...?_

His single good arm came up and blocked a windmill kick from Tobi, then two jabs. He retaliated by bringing his knee up and hitting Tobi in the chest, but to his disappointment, it only passed through his chest. _This jutsu, how am I supposed to get around it?_

The scarred face held two fingers in front of him, and Deidara realized they were held into the tiger seal. _Need to divert the explosion-_

He jumped back as Tobi realized the attack. **"Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!"**

Fire consolidated into a ball in front of him, and he grimaced as his hand shot out a multitude of beetles. **"C1 Disruption!"**

His insects struck the ball and exploded in small bursts, dissipating the flaming ball. It only took a few to break down the incoming jutsu, and the rest flew towards Tobi, who's Mangekyou eye was emitting those odd air currents. The clay insects seemed to pause in their trajectory, and then were sucked into the center of the offset air. They disappeared into nothingness, and when they were gone, Tobi gave him a thin smile.

"You'll have to do much better than that if you want to land a blow. As it is, you can't." He shook his head at the two of them, and Deidara's lip curled. "I gave you a chance to work with me, we could have done this together. But no, your betrayal of my trust only goes to show I have been right in doing this alone. This world and its lies..." He folded his hands into another set of hand signs, and the Iwagakure-nin felt the chakra cords stress his muscles into a jump. At the same time, he dug his good arm into its clay pocket.

"...will all soon be swept away! **Fire Style: Flame Frenzy Stream!"** Diedara jumped, avoiding the carpet of flame that emitted from Tobi's mouth onto the ground. The landscape became very bright and hot, and then suddenly there was a gurgling choking sound. _Sasori, he got hit!_ The chakra cords on him snapped and he lost his momentum, having counted on Sasori to guide his movements. He adjusted himself, trying to steer his aching body into a safe landing, but suddenly Tobi was in front of him. Cursing, he brought his arms into an X to intercept Tobi's fist, but he could not make himself block the kick that hit his side and sent him crashing to the ground.

Coughing up blood, he looked desperately at Sasori. The other had not moved, and the remnants of the flames were till licking his charred body. However, he still gave a small nod to Deidara, reattaching the strings.

Frustrated, the blonde Akatsuki turned back to Tobi. _I have to keep him from attacking Sasori, or else then I have to control myself when I know I can't in my current condition. But how do both attack him and defend us both?_

Tobi was laughing again. "Why would I want a partner as weak as you, now that I think about it. You're clumsy, deranged in the mind, and selfish. How you got into Akatsuki will always remain a mystery to me."

The taunts hurt more than the pain in his side from the kick, but he shrugged them off. He knelt down to rest, placing his palm down on the ground. "Big talk, coming from the man who was duped by a clay clone, hmm."

The laugh turned into calm brooding. "Give up and save me the trouble of this battle. Time is a very precious and inflexible thing; you cannot win, only stall me. And I cannot allow you to go free, either. You know to much now... the both of you."

Smiling, Deidara held up his good arm, stood up. "You sure know how to make us feel special, hmm."

"I told you, you had your chance to-"

"Gotcha- **KATSU!"**

The ground exploded as the four clay voles Deidara had released into the earth finally reached Tobi. The first exploded right under his feet, causing him to lose his balance and fall down. The other three blew straight after, enveloping the creep in a plume of orange flame and gray smoke.

"Dei...dara... get over here, qu...quickly."

Realizing Tobi had again sucked himself in through his visual jutsu, Deidara ran over to Sasori. "What?"

"I think... I'm starting to... figure it out." His voice was so tired Deidara was surprised not to see aged lines on his face. "His jutsu... it's space-time. He's going...into... another dimension!"

"Dimension shifting? I thought those jutsu's were only from myths!"

"Where do... you think... summoning's... come from? If we can slip in...into his dimension... we can attack... from there..."

"How do we get in then?"

The sound of Tobi reemerging ended the conversation, and Deidara whirled around to smash his fist into the other. It went through Tobi's frowning face, and then he was stopped as the other's gloved hand caught his wrist. "To slow." He bodily threw Deidara away, but the blonde recovered and landed on his feet. _So we need a way to get into whatever dimension he's travelling to? A big enough explosion he'll suck himself in, then somehow latch on and fight him in there?_ He curled his fist while his other arm shook helplessly at his side. _Not much choice in the matter, hmm._

Tobi turned to face him again. Behind him, Sasori was moving, much to Deidara concern and surprise. _What's he going to do?_

"I've had enough of this charade," Tobi said flatly. "I've chase after you two long enough, and I've had enough amusement; it's time you sleep." He folded his hands together, apparently oblivious to Sasori's crawling.

"Genjutsu won't work on me, hmm" Deidara growled. _I have to keep him talking, to try and build enough chakra for a C3 detonation. Agh, it hurts to do it with only one hand, but I don't have ay choice any longer._

Tobi lifted his eyebrows, giving his scarred face an ironic look of enjoyment. "It's a good thing it's not genjutsu, then. **KAMUI!"**

Massive shuriken flew out of Tobi's eye again, while his other eye widened in wild satisfaction. Deidara grunted,d ropping himself to the ground, but one of them struck him in his uncoordinated left leg. He cried out in pain, the force of the shuriken sending him skidding across the ground again. The rest of the shuriken flew across and hit the abandoned farmer's building, all but demolishing it.

 _Can't stop, keep moving,_ he told himself, picking himself up. However, Tobi still wasn't done.

 **"Fire Style: Bomb Blast Dance!"** A spinning vortex of hot flame lanced out, and suddenly consolidated itself into a hot cocoon of fire.

And he had nowhere to go. The flames took him in, and the intensity of the heat made him scream. He could feel his skin start to smoke and burn, and his eyes were practically smoldering. _Can't see... or breath..._

The fire ended, and he gasped for air. However, before he could even begin to recover, he heard the thudding of footsteps and felt the connection Tobi's foot to his chin. He spat out another mouthful of blood, landing on his back. In desperation, he flung out the unfinished C3 gargoyle he had been trying to create. **"K-Kat-"**

Tobi kicked it away effortlessly. Deidara, eyes blurry from the flame attack, helplessly trying to back away. However, even though his genjutsu repelling eye was damaged, he could see that Tobi had not managed to divert the gargoyle very far away.

And he saw Sasori's position. _Come on..._

"Let's see you avoid genjutsu now..."

 **"KATSU!"**

The gargoyle detonated, a minor blast compared to what the normal one should have done. Deidara burrowed himself into the earth, avoiding the blast radius to the best he could.

But he saw their plan had worked. _Do your best, Sasori, hmm._

 **XXX**

 **Sasori**

It was a sensation he had never felt before, but it was so rapid he didn't have much time to wonder about it. His arms were firmly clasped onto Tobi's shoulders, gripping them tightly as the two warped away to avoid Deidara's explosion.

 _I can't do any damage in my state... I have to get him to warp a part of his body so Deidara can get him in the real world._

"You little bastard... so you clung onto me into the Kamui dimension?" Tobi tried turning around, but Sasori stuck to him, making it impossible for the other to actually see him. "GET OFF!"

Struggling, Tobi took out a kunai knife and tried to stab him, but he simply couldn't come around to hurt him.

And then a voice Sasori had never expected to hear again made him freeze, and Tobi threw him off.

"AND FINALLY I CAN GET MY HANDS ON YOU BOTH!"

Naruto Uzumaki barreled out of nowehere and punched Tobi in the face, sending him stumbling away. However, he caught the foolish blonde's next kick and tossed him aside.

"Insolent little brat!"

 **"Shadow Clone Jutsu!"** Three shadow clones burst out of smoke in addition the original to attack Tobi, and the air became a flurry of kicks, punches, kunai sparks, and smoke. Sasori blinked, trying to understand what was happening; he had never considered the fact that since Tobi had already known where his hideout was, that he might have been the one who engineered Naruto's supposed escape, when in reality he had actually captured him himself.

 _Will wonders never cease?_ He groaned, feeling a wave of pain wash over his body as he tried to move. He was weak, he could barely move. Perhaps the appearance of the boy was actually beneficial... now Tobi was facing another opponent, and would have to faze out into reality to avoid Naruto's attacks.

"Kid... keep... at him...!" Sasori called as loudly as he could.

"Shut up, you're next for capturing me in the first place, you bastard!"

Sasori didn't reply. The shadow clones were gone, the kid was fighting Tobi one on one again. The older man was much stronger, however; it was apparent he had the upper hand. If Naruto lost, Sasori would be forced to use his Puppetmaster-Puppet Death Sequence... and that was a one-shot attempt that he had never even tried before.

He extended a chakra cord to Tobi's arm, and pulled. The punch that should've flattened the blonde's face instead dragged down, and he was forced to a knee.

And then Naruto's knee was coming up to hit him in the face...

 _Do it... do it..._

The knee passed through his head as it completely disappeared. For a moment, Naruto was stunned as the headless body stood up and adopted another offensive position.

Then it went sprawling forward as something from the other world caused Tobi to forcibly reappear. He coughed out blood as a bruise sported itself on his throat. He stumbled forward, landing on all fours. Naruto took advantage of the situation by landing another kick on the other, one of which he took the full brunt of and sent him to the floor.

"Impossible... _ach_..." He stood up on a knee, caught Naruto's next punch. However, Sasori again pulled on his arm, and he couldn't block the glowing blue chakra ball approaching his stomach...

 **XXX**

 **Deidara**

Tobi's torso and head reappeared. He was bleeding, pain and shock was written all over his face. Gone was the earlier confidence of the man who had pulled the strings of everyone, who had tried to hurt him and his one friend. Now there was only the features who saw his own defeat inexorably approaching him.

Smiling, Deidara tapped his shoulder. Tobi's eyes widened. "You-"

He curled his fingers and put all his pain behind the swing. "It's about time you dream, instead!"


	13. Chapter 13- The Strings are Cut

**And now the final chapter of the Tale of Sasori and Deidara.**

 **(Don't worry, there's a conclusion yet to be written).**

 **XXX**

 **Deidara**

The impact of his punch sent Tobi crashing into the ground, actually forced into the earth in a small crater. The man was all but beaten at this point, and they both seemed to know it as Tobi made no effort to stop Deidara from crouching down in front of him and holding him up by his collar.

"Bring him back, hmm!"

Tobi gave him a crooked smile, but did nothing else.

Deidara smashed his fist into his stomach, and Tobi's smile froze as blood leaked out of his mouth. Hacking, his voice took on a labored tone.

"You figured out my jutsu and used it against me… however, there is a fatal flaw you're only just now realizing, isn't there? You can't make me bring him back… and now he can rot in the Kamui Dimension for as long as I care."

"DAMN YOU!" He sunk his fist back into his stomach again, and again. The frustration of incomplete victory was blinding him to the possibility the more he mangled Tobi's innards, the greater the chance _any_ hope of Sasori returning from wherever he had been sent to.

Tobi continued to soak up the damage like a sponge, and soon his face was matted with his own blood. The whole situation seemed familiar to Deidara somehow, like a strange deja vu…

A C2 detonation creature gave from his hand. Tobi watched it with a wide eye, but he was to wounded to properly defend himself. He squirmed under Deidara's iron grip, to no use. "No… I can't…. it can't end..."

The hand came down-

Deidara's eyes snapped open, and his hand froze. _What am I doing? This…_

It was almost like when the Nine-Tails jinchuuriki had been beating him i the forest. The wild, savage beast of the fox emerging in him as he unleashed his fury onto Deidara. Back then, the unrefined brutality had both entertained and repulsed him. Where had the finer art of the shinobi gone in the boy? Replaced by animal ferocity, something he would never sink to…

 _What was the difference now?_

Tobi started to laugh underneath him. "So, you finally see how barbaric you really are in this world, don't you? How fragile your emotions are in this sick reality?"

"What are you talking about, hmm?"

"Don't tell me you're this ignorant… you nearly senselessly killed me, even though you know if you do so you'll never see your partner again. Weren't you only interested in his protection a few minutes ago?" Tobi coughed up blood, but he was still smiling. "Look at the world around us, you blind fool. Can your eye enhancement not zoom in on the woes surrounding us all?"

His grip lessened on Tobi, his confidence and hatred fading. To his subconscious surprise, Tobi didn't try to resist. In fact, it seemed like he was talking to himself more than Deidara, a fanatical light in his eyes that tried to hide some sort of internal pain. "Pain is brought upon by compassion for others, and then that pain causes things to change in people. Things we wouldn't expect to happen occurs... and we alone have to fix it. You can't trust others to work with you, or the cycle repeats. But you... you and Sasori remind me so much of me and..."

He shook his head, and suddenly his eyes widened in fury. "You two don't understand what you're in the way of. These plans have been set in stone, and no matter what you two think is right, it's not. SO JUST GET OUT OF THE WAY!"

In a burst of strength, Tobi shoved Deidara off him. At the same time, a trio of massive shuriken flew out his eye and impaled Deidara in his remaining arm and legs, pinning him painfully to the sand. The force of impact had not stuck the shuriken deep into the loose earth, but his strength had abandoned him once more, as had the chakra Sasori had lent him.

"You've seen the barbarism of this world, Deidara; you yourself were just a victim of it," Tobi said grimly, holding up a fourth massive shuriken in his hand. "You had your chance to recognize it and reform, but you remain blind to the fact-"

"I'm not going to turn on my friend, hmm," the blonde replied stiffly, and Tobi's Mangekyo eye twitched. _Can't... move anything... he's got me pinned._ "You can rant on how this world is unfair, and maybe before all this I would've gone along with it. We never hear of the artist working with another, it's always the rivalry..." He exhaled hoarsely, feeling blood flowing out of his wounds and weakening him further. "But now I know you _can_ work with another, you don't have to be alone, hmm. It fills the void of that pain..."

Tobi started to laugh again, something insane that made Deidara stop. "Just shut up," he asserted suddenly. "What would you know of what the world has to offer, to men like you, men like me? We cannot form these bonds, that's why we are called rogue ninja. Our villages despise us, and no one wants to work with us. Akatsuki being an organization is a joke, a _joke_! A loose collection of society's outcasts; there's no way monsters like us can fill in this... this... this _void_ , with something called friendship!"

He couldn't find anything to say, Tobi's words were so rough and passionate. With the air empty between them, Tobi grinned maliciously at him, bringing fake joy to his scarred features, his eyes lighting up with that insane light once more. "There's only one way to fill in this void, Deidara... unfortunately, _you_ have no place in it!"

 **XXX**

 **Sasori**

His body was collapsed on the ground, his head turned towards the furious blonde, who was staring at him with undisguised anger. Sasori could hardly blame him, if he had been kidnapped and stuffed into a cramped puppet, he would be more than a little upset, too.

At the same time, he knew what little movement he had exerted during the scuffle with the unmasked Tobi has reopened the wound in the core, and the _drip_ onto the strange material the ground was made of told him that perhaps, if the blonde didn't move soon, he would be throttling a dead body. Tobi had dematerialized minutes ago; yet Naruto had not moved to kill him, though he stood there shaking in anger.

"What are... you... waiting for?"

"I... I don't know." He clenched his fists, staring at him. "For a while, I've felt the need to kill you, and in the pit I was locked up in, that feeling only fostered."

"Then... why haven't you...?"

"You and your partner... I thought you two hated each other. But in that pit, I could hear you two arguing, like me and Sasuke used to. And when Tobi captured me, I could hear him ranting to himself about how you two 'worked so smoothly' all of a sudden. "His fists unclenched, and the red glare in them slowly faded away. "You both are like little kids fighting and making up, it's almost like you don't _know_ how to be friends."

"I can't say... we're... well versed... in it."

Naruto gave him a small smile. "Just like little kids, it's... funny to see."

He could hardly believe the youth had gone from almost wanting to kill him to now near-lecturing him. _How the world works is beautiful, Tobi is wrong, so wrong..._

"My sensei taught me something important, when I was training with him. He said that for there to be peace in the world, people should 'try to understand each other.' I didn't know what that meant at the time, but now I think I do. I judged you two because you were Akatsuki, and generalized you as monsters like the stories I'd been told. Its hard to imagine your enemies as anything but heartless beings... but then you see why there isn't peace, because in conflict you always see them as just that. Maybe, if we saw clearer to each other, we could have peace..."

"Tobi doesn't see... it like... that..." Sasori wheezed. "He doesn't... have... faith in... people... anymore..."

"I know," Naruto agreed, and he took on a more resolute tone. "And that's why we have to stop him. But I don't see how we're going to get out of here... could your partner force him to eject us?"

"If he... could... he already... would have..."

The life seemed to leave Naruto's eyes. "Are you saying..."

Sasori clutched his wound, then fell back to the alien ground. The shock of their predicament had faded, and perhaps the futility of it, combined with Naruto's sudden realization of the situation, made him talk stronger to control the situation.

For what little control he could provide. "Yes, we're stuck here. If Tobi dies, then we'll be stuck here forever. As it is... he's a crooked man; he won't release us even if Deidara beats him within an inch of his life."

Naruto sat down. "Wow... that's it then? We die here?"

"I'm dying one way or another," Sasori chuckled, which both frightened and calmed him. _Deidara will remember me... I will not fade from this world in that sense..._

He was about to close his eyes and allow himself to slip when a new voice broke through the emptiness. "We're not completely stuck here. While I hoped I would only be rescuing Naruto and finishing you off, the notion of 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' has never been greater."

Sasori cocked his head, eyes snapping open with what little energy he had left, but then almost immediately relaxed. _Wonders never cease._

"Naruto, come over to Sasori," Kakashi Hatake said grimly, his face pale from the poison flowing through him, but voice taut with determination to explain his plan. "I think I've developed a theory between the eyes Tobi and I possess..."

 **XXX**

 **Deidara**

The large shuriken was about to impale him in the heart was Tobi suddenly froze, the steel inches from his face. Beads of sweat were running down the blonde's face, as he stared death in the eye. _Why's he stopped? What's going on?_

A moment after the thought was made, Tobi dropped to the ground, screaming. _"MY EYE, MY EYE!"_ he was shouting. _"HOW ARE YOU SHOWING ME THIS?"  
_

Bemused, Deidara stayed down as Tobi crumpled to his knees, his free hand clutching his Mangekyo eye. _"YOU THINK THIS... WILL CHANGE! CHANGE ANYTHING-?"_

Tobi's head seemed to implode, and from his eye three shapes were suddenly flung out. Their assailant gave a sound as if all the guts had been crushed in his body, then fell back to the ground, breathing just as awfully. The fight seemed to have left him once more, and he still clutched his Mangekyo Sharingan as if it were the most painful object in the world to him.

Three of the shaps, which he already knew to people, stood up. "Jeez, thanks Kakashi sensei," said the blonde jinchuuriki, the one called Naruto. "I didn't think we'd be getting out of that. How'd you get put in there anyhow?"

"It's like what happened to you," Kakashi mumbled, standing up quickly. "He sucked me in after I had fought Sasori. I don't know what he planned to do with me... or with you for that matter." He slowly approached Tobi's unmoving body, stared down at his apprehensively. "I had had a theory about your ocular jutsu, that it might be linked with mine. I tested it out by linking myself to you... you saw more than I expected, and the effort exhausted me as well. In the end, I simply chose your eye as the exit point for us to emerge from." The silver-haired jonin crouched down next to Tobi, as if he was talking to an old friend he was disappointed in. "How you've fallen, Obito..."

Deidara was no longer listening to what was going on, however. He had just noticed the third ejected body, which was lying in a slowly reddening ground. With sudden inspiration, he flooded his limbs with chakra and pulled his arms free of their shuriken shackles. "Sasori..."

"Hey... you... took him down... after all..."

"No, you can't die... not after what we've gone through!"

Sasori chuckled weakly. His core was bleeding s bad as ever, but it seemed to be smaller streams. Could it be healing? Was there still a chance to save him? If there was, the slightest chance, he had to take it now-

"What.. you're seeing is... liquid... chakra," Sasori breathed. He seemed to grow more regal, and his words more clear. He was making an effort to get final words in. "My whole soul was condensed into the Core. It's finally beginning to run out...

"You can't die, hmm" Deidara repeated hollowly, though deep inside he knew it was hopeless. "We were-"

"I wasn't meant to last forever, I see that now. I tried to make myself immortal, because I only cared myself and therefore would only ever need myself. But you... you and I... we changed each other, and now you're the one who will carry that change, and my memory." Sasori clutched Deidara's shoulder, the wooden limbs creaking. "The void of loneliness... we helped each other fill it in. Now _you_ have to finish filling it in."

Deidara held the wood, and for the first time he did not envision it as a puppet. The painted eyes, which had always held such emptiness, suddenly seemed brimming with life. The words coming from his dying partner were sincere, and in it, he could see his humanity that the puppetmaster had fought for so long had finally won out.

"The art of longetivity..."

"Some things are meant to last, but not all, Deidara." Sasori smiled weakly, his hand coming up to clutch his core painfully. "I wasn't meant to... you were. You can fill in the emptiness with others, and last long for them."

"You were my friend, Sasori. You...

"I will miss you... too... clay boy..."

Sasori's words were so soft he had to lean his ear down to his partner's lips. "I think I understand why I almost let Granny Chiyo kill me, back at the hideout. She wanted to see if I had the humility to acknowledge my crimes and let myself be killed... to pay for what I had done. And I had almost done it... now, on the brink... I'm ready, I think... to see them all as Sasori of Sunagakure... not Sasori of the Red Sand...I can fill... in the void... my own... way..."

Something left the painted eyes, and the Core stopped emitting red fluid chakra. Deidara held the hand of his friend for perhaps a century, unwilling to let go, least he fearSasori would be gone forever, and there would be nothing left of his friend to remember. Finally, events behind him drew his attention away.

Kakashi and Naruto were facing a weakened but standing Obito, who was again laughing madly at them both. "You think I _want_ to change, Kakashi? The past is the pastl it will remain as such. _Now,_ I am wiser, stronger, and know what must be done for the world if we are to exist. We must destroy it to save it, to save everyone from this hated cycle!"

"You've lost your senses as a shinobi, Obito," Kakashi said sadly. "Look inside yourself, one more time-"

"This world made me, made you!" Tobi snarled viciously. Finally, he noticed Deidara staring at them, and he smiled grimly. Pointing a finger, he called, "Look at him, look at this boy! Losing his friend, just like I lost Rin. This world will always create people like me, fillwed with the anguish of their friends or family, then releasing that anger on those around him. He is a victim of this inane world, one I will change- if you bastards would only get out of the way!"

"You're wrong."

Tobi paused, seemingly surprised he had spoken. However, he almost instantly began laughing once more. "You cannot deny your hatred for this world, for me," he scoffed. "The pain of losing someone you care about cannot be held back- and the desire to exact that pain on another equally immense!"

Diedara sighed. "Sasori held back his humility to escape what the world had done to him, just like I swarmed myself in my art to escape what it had done to me. But now, he was able to accept his humility in the end, despite what had happened to him. You say working alone, without anyone else is the answer, but that's because you refuse to fill in the void of the loss you experienced."

Tobi's Mangekyo eye twitched again. "Friendship, bonds, they mean nothing," he sneered, his eyes flickering to Kakashi briefly. "Through solitude, the pain of loss and weakness of these bonds are forgotten-"

"But you still don't understand it at all. You can say all that, say you ignore it all, but in the end, the void remains as it is." His eye narrowed behind his shock of golden hair. "And if you believe that it's been fulfilled, then I should kill you now. You're like a virus spreading your hatred, fanatical to a dream that'll only harm those you care about. Sasori had enough faith in the world to accept it and his humanity again, and I won't allow you to take it away any further!"

The sands were quiet around them as Tobi stared at him impassively. Kakashi and Naruto likewise stood stock still, caught in the volley of words, and it was clear to all of them, through Tobi's silence, that the Iwagakure rogue had won.

With a deranged yell, Tobi clasped his hands together, but Deidara had already anticipated the futile attempt he would make. **"Fire Style: Bomb Blast Dance!"**

 **"C3 Torpedo!"**

His clay bomb sailed forward through the flames, while Naruto summoned a multitude of clones, which sacrificed themselves to absorb the swirling vortex of flames approaching them. And through the flames, he knew Tobi would see the clay bomb approaching wit his Sharingan, and would be using his ocular jutsu to flee, to cause more damage-

Kakashi crumpled to the ground, his hand at his own Sharingan. "I'm sorry, Obito," he whispered to himself. From beyond the flames, he heard Tobi give another yell of pain as Kakashi once again linked their eyes.

The last of reserves went into the final justu. **"Earth Style: Subterranean Cave Jutsu!"**

As the C2 torpedo went off, the ground dropped beneath them, the sand and hardened earth beneath them dissolving as he worked his chakra furiously through it. They dropped, and the shockwave went above their heads. The explosion was deafening in itself, and they all covered their ears until it had passed, and even then there was a stark ringing. In it, Deidara knew Sasori's body was gone, decimated, and it saddened him...

Naruto sighed, lying down against the sandstone Deidara had created. "It's over, finally!"

Kakashi gave a gasp of exhaustion, then turned to Deidara. "Your partner up there, was he really...?"

"Yes." he felt to tired to talk about it. "So, are you two going to bring me in, or-"

A hand clutched his throat and slammed him against the sandstone, and then Tobi's face materialized in front of him. The skin was singed all around, and most of his cloak had burned away. The flesh on the damaged side of his face was especially blackened, and the Sharingan there flared with live fury. "You used the earth style jutsu to early," he hacked out. "It broke Kakashi's concentration, and gave me the chance to escape, though I did definitely take a beating of it. However..." He tightened his grip around his throat, and he smiled toothily. "You have no more chakra left, and these two can't take a stab at me, or I'll move that piece of my body to the Kamui Dimension, and they'll hit you instead. _I win_."

His vision was darkening, it was difficult to breath...

 _Maybe I'll be seeing you after all... Sasori..._

"No..." Tobi's voice went soft, and his grip loosened. "You _want_ to die, don't you? To see him? No... you'll remain of this damned earth until I change it, and then you'll see what good I am for it."

"Rot in hell," Deidara bit out.

"Let him go!" Naruto shouted, stepping forward menacingly. With his other hand, Tobi waggled a finger mockingly, as if he were addressing a child who had done wrong.

"No, you said this world has hope? Go find it for yourself, scum, and tell me if you ever find it. When you're broken down, you'll understand what a fool Sasori was for believing in it in the end, and you'll believe in me then!"

In a whirlwind if displaced air, he was gone again, and this time Deidara knew he would not return. He slumped against the cold but welcoming sandstone, like the arms of an angel, and allowed himself to close his eyes at last.


	14. Conclusion

**XXX**

 **Deidara**

They all stood before him, corpeal through the jutsu the Leader used to hold their meetings.

"Why have Sasori and you not returned to the main base yet?" The Leader asked quietly, while the rest of Akatsuki stood solemnly, watching him. The gaze of Itachi Uchiha seemed to especially bore into him, as if he somehow knew what was forthcoming before the rest.

"We... I am not returning, hmm."

Somehow, the silence grew, and suddenly the atmosphere changed from neutral to cold. To his direct left, Hidan shuffled indignantly, his slower mind still processing what he had said. The threat of immediate retaliation, what with their communication being through chakra holograms, was nonexistent, but the chill in the air was almost enough to make him take a step back.

"You what?" The slow, deep voice of the Leader vibrated in the cavern from his fingerpost.

 _It's now or never._ "You all... are being used. By a man behind the shadows, hmm."

"We're _what_?" Kisame's laughter roiled through the chamber. "Sorry, I think Deidara took one to many explosions to the face. Stupid brat, how would us, the most fearful rogue ninja in the continent, be used by another, it's ridiculous."

"You have to believe me," Deidara pleaded. "The Akatsuki... a man called Tobi, he is running things from the shadows, pulling strings. We're working for some hidden agenda, something that's beyond any of us, hmm. He's an Uchiha, he's a madman, he's-"

"The Uchiha Clan is extinct except for my brother and myself," Itachi Uchiha broke out smoothly. He was looking at Deidara was slight interest, though his Sharigan, those blank and menacing Sharingan he detested endlessly, bored into him like a nail through wood. "Your identification of this adept is thus impossible. There is no other man who wields the Sharingan except Kakashi Hatake. You are talking nothing but lies. Now, tell us the real reason for this sudden change of heart, or I will remove the information by force."

The simple words bore enough suggestion that Deidara felt himself sweating. He was unsure whether Itachi's Tsukuyomi would actually hit him through the hologram, since they could still see each other, even if he was no actually there. _Keep it cool. You have to get it through to them-_

"He... he killed Sasori, hmm. And tried to kidnap the Nine-Tails from us, did in fact, and he's been hunting us, until we stopped him-"

"You captured the Nine-Tails? Absurd," Hidan scoffed. "It almost killed you last time! And now you miraculously captured it, just now? Bullshit."

"And you didn't report it," Kakuzua added harshly. "You have no way to backup your words, unless you still have him?"

"I... was to weak to contain him. I had to let him go..."

A mocking cough from Kisame again. "Of course, of course! A loophole for everything? Humor us, Deidara, this man, is there _any_ way for you to back up your words? Because right now your grave is only being dug deeper." He hefted his blade Samehada, his small eyes piercing his soul. "One does not leave Akatsuki, ever. This was established after Kakuzu's previous partner tried to. Stop this fabricated nonsense."

"Zetsu!" Deidara blurted, trying one last time. "He works for him- he use the spores on us to lead Tobi right to us! He's a spy for him- he reports everything going on to him, hmm!"

Kisame turned jovially to Zetsu, who had not spoken a word since the meeting had begun. "Dear Zetsu, anything you'd like to add?"

"Utter nonsense!" White Zetsu cried indignantly. "Why, we would never betray Akatsuki. There is no such pretender called Tobi, to our knowledge-"

"OF COURSE HE WOULD DENY IT, HE WORKS FOR HIM, HMM!" Deidara shouted. "Itachi, Tsukuyomi him, get the truth-"

The Leader's deep voice penetrated the argument, and as he spoke, Deidara knew there was no longer any hope. "Deidara, your allegiance has obviously changed, to accuse Zetsu, perhaps the most dedicated out of all of us." His voice was grating but secretive, as if the Leader somehow knew everything he was saying held some sort of truth.

The _Leader_...

"Nagato," Deidara pleaded. "He told me your name, Tobi did. He told me, you've never told us any of that-"

The Rinnegan widened in momentary surprise, but then the instant was gone. They narrowed into cold purple slits. "Where you came to possess such information is beyond me," he said sharply. "Your story holds no truth, Deidara. In fact, it seems to me you've tried to create some farfetched story to cover up Sasori's death-"

Deidara stopped cold. "No," he whispered. "You can't be suggesting..."

"Killing another member... is an act that cannot be forgiven unless you are of Kakuzu's anger levels. You want to leave us? Very well, boy, your time here is at an end. No longer will you be welcomed by us, but now you shall not only be hunted by the nations of our land, but by its criminals as well." The Leader, Nagato, extended a finger and pointed it at him. "From now on, you are a man with no home, as decreed by a God."

He had tried. He had truly tried to make them see the truth of it all, but they were right. What evidence did he have of all this? None, there was nothing he could do, especially with Zetsu denying everything.

Akatsuki- if it had ever truly existed- was no more to him.

The image in front of him faded as the Leader clasped his hands together. He was facing the oasis from the battle, having used it to perform the ritual, and faced it silently, in deep thought. _There was nothing more I could do. I... I tried._

He looked up from the pond, and gave himself a small smile. _It was the most I could do. Not everything works out how we wanted, but I did not leave them to wallow in the darkness, blind to what goes on around them. Perhaps they can figure it out for themselves; Itachi definitely seemed to know something was wrong. It was the best that could be done..._

 **XXX**

The Core was the only thing he had salvaged from Sasori's burnt and mangled puppet body, which had been devestated in the C3 detonation. Luckily, he had thought to snag it before he had create the earth-style cave. Now, as he soared above the bleak desert towards Sasori's workshop, he pulled it out.

It fit snugly in his hand, and was still warm with whatever Sasori had harbored inside it. The liquid chakra had hardened around it, coating it in murky red. He held it tightly, trying to ignore the entire section that had gone missing. _A man with no home... wasn't it so much easier to accept that before? Now it's... daunting. Sasori, would you be the same, if you were still with me?_

Bonds. That's what had created him The bond with another, the feeling of connection with another human. In the most bizarre circumstances, it had not even been completely human with who he had bonded with; but the sentiment remained.

 _You must finish filling in the void._

Some time later, he touched down outside the hideout. He wasted no time; Zetsu had obviously been to the hideout before, and although Deidara had ditched his Akatsuki cloak during the journey, knowing a spore was somewhere hidden along it, he suspected Zetsu might believe he would come looking for him here, and bring unwanted company with him.

In a few minutes, he had dug a 2 foot hole in the ground. Unsure of really what to do, never having participated in a funeral, let alone a burial, he tossed the Core into the hole.

 _The void of loneliness... we helped each other fill it in. Now_ you _have to finish filling it in._ That was what he had told him, Sasori's dying request. And he would answer it.

"Thank you," he said quietly to the Core, then shoved the sand on top of it. There was no way to tell if anything was buried there, if by chance someone else discovered this place. His unmarked grave would remain undisturbed and exist forever- something fitting for the man who had wanted to do the same for years.

He stood there awkwardly, wanting to say more, feeling he should for the man who had in such a short time had done more than anyone had in his young life.

Somehow, he knew Sasori would understand the briefness of his words and understand every ounce of meaning he had put into them. So, with a flourish of his hair, he saddled the clay bird once more and took off for the place he hoped would finish filling in the void.

 _I will be seeing you soon, Sasori._

 **XXX**

 **Other**

"What a touching affair," Black Zetsu remarked. "Such a quick ceremony- and bothersome one. These human customs of burying the dead are truly hampering to us, when all we want to do is eat their body. I can barely tell where Sasori's Core was buried-"

"Don't look for it and don't touch it."

"Why?"

"Because I said not to."

"Oh," White Zetsu said thoughtfully. "Don't tell me seeing him and Sasori bond is reminding you of your former relationship with Kakashi?"

It was true. The inexplicable, sudden, deep trust that had formed in days between the Deidara and Sasori had reminded him to much of the same sudden respect and trust that he had developed with Kakashi during the mission to Kannabi Bridge. Even the suddenness of Sasori's death, which had been similar to his own at the time, was the same.

And just like Kakashi, Deidara was somehow maintaining his grasp on the hope the world offered, even with his best friend suddenly slipping through his fingers as quickly as it had been formed. But seeing them... it had almost seemed like that in the world that had abandoned him, there was still the smallest, possible glimpse of hope that there might be something wonderful in it, something that had, in that moment of confrontation with Kakashi, almost made him turn back...

But no. Project Tsukuyomi had progressed to far. There was no stopping it; like the tide of the ocean, it would always come back no matter how far it retreated. It had swallowed him whole, and even though as he watched Deidara fly confidently off towards an unknown destination, with a confidence he very much wanted back in his own plan, he knew he could not forsake what had to be done.

 _The past is the past... see how Deidara buries it away... the future is Tsukuyomi, and there is no point in forestalling the inventible. This... is the only way peace can be reliably created. Not on the whims of random friendship and hope..._

"Obito, are you even listening to what we say?"

He banished the thoughts from the past that had been invading his mind. "What do you want?"

"We asked if you want us to multiply the spores on Deidara. He saw through the one on his cloak, but he hasn't noticed the ones we snuck in behind his hair. Doing so would siphon his chakra off and probably kill him."

"No, let him go."

Black Zetsu, despite lacking any facial features, recoiled the entire head in surprise. "You want to let him go free," he said in his raspy, inhuman tone. "He has much information on Ataksuki; he's very dangerous-"

"No matter what secrets he has, he is only a minor problem. There are more pressing matters: such as recapturing the Nine-Tails and the rest of the tailed beasts. There is more work to be done; one blonde fool is the least of my concerns. Allow Nagato to spend his time chasing after him; but you are not to tell him his location with the spores."

"And why not?" White Zetsu was being repressed; to Tobi's bewilderment, Black Zetsu had pushed himself to the front. His single yellow eye examined him deeply.

"Because I said so. Besides, where will he go? He has nowhere he can go to for comfort. Allow him to live out the remainder of his life in solitude and see how Sasori lied to him of the world being a beautiful place. I want to see him crumble... and finally give up with his mediocre ideals!"

Angry with himself and feeling a tear well up in his eye as more memories poured into him from the past, he disappeared to where no one could hear him scream.

 **XXX**

 **Deidara**

The Gates of Iwakgakure were very familiar to him; it was almost as if he was walking back into the village from his first mission with Oniki. Now, he glided the bird down in front of the entrance. The guards there were stunned, made almost no movement to apprehend one of their most wanted. They probably never would have suspected him walking right into their arms.

"Y-You're Deidara-!"

"I know. I surrender." He extended his lone arm, and one hesitantly drew handcuffs, then locked his hand to his own.

"We need to take him to the Tsuchikage for judgement," the one he was cuffed to said uneasily. "Cover his back."

They proceeded to walk through the village. Not much had changed; the houses were still made of the same old cracked stone, the same kids played around the market square, the same veterans stood quietly by their memorials. However, the procession began to attract eyes away from the everyday business.

The eyes of hundreds, following him, one of the few who had ever left the Village Hidden in the Stones, and definitely the most well-known criminal among those who had even survived abandoning the village. The crowd followed him eagerly, knowing perhaps what fate awaited him. He imagined they were excited by the prospect of it being public, but he shook the feeling off. His guards held him stiffly as they went up the steps to the Tsuchikage's office, a towering prison-like structure that jutted out into the sky, where the only beauty rested inside the courtyard he had been to so long ago…

Four men were waiting at the top of the steps, where the front doors had already been held open. A stream of guards exited and barred the crowd from coming any further in.

One of the men approached, and he recognized him as the Iwagakure Brigadier General, a man of great skill who was Oniki's second in command. He looked him up and down coldly, before waving off his escorts. "Fine work, gentlemen," he said proudly. "The Elite will take it from here." On the final word, the other three men, who indeed boasted the emblem of the Elite on their right chest pocket, wound him up in a series of glowing brown chains, which instantly snapped his remaining arm to his side. There was no way t move except walk where they guided him now.

The doors closed behind him, shutting out the outside world. They took him through the Office, where multiple other guards stood on standby.

And suddenly, he was outside again, and he knew what awaited him. However, he froze as he heard the words coming from his old sensei's mouth.

"Lord Tsuchikage."

"Mishimoto, I said no interruptions during my granddaughter's training! Why are… what-"

The Brigadier General pulled Deidara by his hair forward, making him wince. He was dumped unceremoniously on the crowd, making him even filthier than he already was.

"The Rogue, Deidara, Undesirable Number One. He surrendered at the front gates in this state; obviously, the shame of abandoning his village finally got to him."

Deidara looked up from the ground. Oniki was as elderly as ever, his eyes blankly staring at him. But further behind him…

 _She's still here… and as beautiful as the day I left… left it all behind…_

"Mishimoto, I desire time alone with the captive. You may undo the bindings on him, it's quite clear he didn't come here to make threat."

The Brigadier General's brow furrowed, and his voice became tense. "He is our most notorious outlaw; we should execute him now. His crimes are evident, there is no need for any trial, mock or not. Killing him in the square will be satisfactory enough for the people and the daimyo-"

"I am well aware, General. Now wait outside the courtyard until I order otherwise."

The General opened his mouth, then curled his lip. "As you wish, Oniki." He snapped his fingers, and the Elite undid the chains binding him. Slowly, he picked himself up, face down so that no one could see the emotions rippling across his face.

 _Send her away to, please… my judgement is only for you to carry out, I don't want her to see… see what I am…_

The doors to the courtyard shut. They were three, the former trio who had trained in the greenery of the courtyard. Some of the only life that had existed inside the barren Land of Earth. How foolish had it been, back then, to want to destroy it all…

"Kurostichi, you too. Leave us."

"Grandfather, I have just as much as a right-"

"GO!"

"No! I have just as much as a right to be here as you do. He left us both when he left the village, I can hear what he says." She was looking down at him, and though her tone was strong, her eyes betrayed what she felt. _Why have you come back?_ They said. _Do you want to cause more pain?_

"Sensei…"

The Tsuchikage froze again. "Now what," he answered snidely. "Do I deserve to be called that again? Is General Misihimto right, have you come back here groveling for your life, when you're on the verge of defeat? Where is your honor, with that ragtag group of misfits called Akatsuki?"

"I'm sorry, sensei, hmm." He said it as sincerely as he could manage in the state he was in, on the verge of tears. _No, I have to do this. Sasori… his grandmother tried to let him answer judgement for what he did, that's what he said. And he refused then, but accepted judgement in the end, from his loved ones in the next life._ This _is filling the void… seeking the forgiveness, then dying. In death, I answer for what I've done to these people…_

Oniki was baffled, but soon recovered. "You're sorry?" he sniffed stiffly. "How many years? How many deaths? One of our most sacred techniques, stolen so insolently, as if it were a piece of chocolate! You hateful child, you think you can waltz into your homeland-"

"That hates me, that wants every part of me to be killed. hmm? Do you think I came here for my own enjoyment," he shouted, unable to hold in the nervousness he felt. Kurostichi's presence was unnerving him; he had hoped it would be just Oniki he would seek his punishment from. He was his sensei, the fatherly figure. It was from him the attachment had been most real, he felt, the only one who could truly fill in the void of loneliness and guilt…

"I… I was a fool, when I left the village. But now, I understand what you tried to teach me. The unity of the village, the bonds… a friend, like me, he opened me up…" The words were fumbling, and Oniki was appearing ore and more mystified. Deidara knew what he was thinking: _How would you feel if the student you treasured as your equal betrayed you out of the blue, then returned just the same?_

Kurostichi was still staring at him. He ignored it.

"Sensei… I've come to ask for your judgement on me. Only you… have the right to end me. You are right, my crimes are numerous, hmm. My partner-a great man- hated the world like I did. We found no excitement in it, did not value it! But then, we found each other as friends, something to replace the emptiness… he said I must finish filling in that void. And now… I ask you to pass judgement on me, to make sure the void never empties again, hmm!"

Oniki opened his mouth, closed it. His eyes also closed, and his forehead creased. "Your void needs to be filled?" he said quietly. "You've changed?"

"I am sorry, hmm," he said again, and this time he kneeled.

And waited.

"Deidara, my former pupil… I cannot forgive you for what you have done. Your words may ring honest, but in my heart I cannot forgive you, and neither can the hearts of all the people you betrayed." Deidara looked up into the distantly regretful face of his sensei. "You will go to the city square with general Mishimoto and be publicly executed for your crimes. That is the way it must end, your previous transgressions cannot be forgiven-"

"Grandfather, you can't!" Kurostichi cried. "He wants to be forgiven, that's all he wants! Can you not give a condemned man the only thing he wants!"

Oniki's eyebrows came down. "You are too young and naïve, Kurostichi," he said gruffly. "You cannot let the emotions you once felt for him get in the way of justice-"

"He just wants your forgiveness!"

"Kurostichi-"

To Deidara's deep shock, she walked over to him and stood in front of him, between pupil and sensei. "I believe in justice, and you being to cold-hearted to find even a shred of forgiveness for him is not it."

 _She's defending me? Why? She must hate me just as much as the rest of the village. Or…_

It had not occurred to him that there might be someone who still cared for him, in the world he had left. _Bonds… they go both ways. Could she really still be caring for me, after what I've done?_

"He was your pupil, like a son, you said!" she went on. "You cried for days when he left, admitted that you would not have been able to kill him the day he left! But now, at your feet, he asks to be forgiven, before he allowed _himself_ to be killed?" Her voice tremored. "Are the bonds you taught us about this easily broken? Can you bend them just as easily as you please?"

Oniki closed his eyes again. Deidara looked at Kurostichi, dumbfounded. "You still…?"

She turned to face him. "Some bonds can be broken, but I never did with you," she said quietly. "I always hoped you would come back, someday…"

"General Mishimoto!" The general and his men entered with no pause, as if they had been waiting all along.

"Shall we proceed, Lord Tsuchikage?"

"No- escort Deidara down to the dungeons and put him under strict guard. I believe his intentions are sincere to forgiving the village, and he is willing to help us once again."

Mishimoto's face grew red. "You cannot disregard our law because he is your former pupil," he said dangerously. "He must face execution!"

"And it is our most sacred law," Oniki countered just as coldly. "To uphold the bonds of the village. There are other ways a man can pay for his crimes, General. He wanted to die; he will live. And he will live in service to the village that, in due time, will come to acknowledge him again. You have your orders."

The other grew even redder, but relapsed. "Very well. Come, prisoner."

"Why?" Deidara asked. "Why are you doing this, why won't you just kill me?"

"Because there are other ways to fill in the void you speak of, Deidara. And you are not the only one who has been empty of the person they once held close to them." Oniki came over and put a hand on his shoulder, offered a small smile.

Kurostichi came up and hugged him. "Does this mean we can do missions together again?" she whispered, and he felt his chest burn with a sensation he had not felt since he left.

"Y…yeah… hmm…"

 _Sasori… perhaps it will be a bit longer before I see you, my friend, but can understand, right? To fill in the void… with others, not just their judgement._

 _When I see you, maybe we can both live our lives they were meant to be._

They carted him off into the coldness of the cell, but it did not affect him; the warmth of his sensei's and Kurostichi's touch would last him till the day he died.


	15. Author's Note

**And that wraps up this adventure, I hope it was an ending you all can appreciate in one way or another. I enjoyed writing this, since these two were such amazing characters that met, in my opinion, unfair ends (especially Sasori, being killed in the firsts season, come on, like come on). A final thank you to those who wrote reviews, favorited or followed, or found even the smallest bit of enjoyment in my work. In the end, I just like to imagine I gave someone something interesting to read, and all those little gestures show just that.**

 **If you guys would like to see more takes on these "alternate" story lines for certain characters, leave me a review or DM on who you think should be next! If that doesn't interest you, I got another new story I'm writing called "Unity" going, have a look at that if you like! Otherwise, again I hope you enjoyed reading "And the Artists Played On: The Tale of Sasori and Deidara," and hope to see you around!"**


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